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A WORD IN SEASON ; 



REVIEW OF THE POLITICAL LIFE AND OPINIONS 



MARTIN VAN BURKN. 



AnOUESKKD 



TO TIIR KNTIRE UEMOCllACV OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE 

1 



. •'"V^ ■ " We contend for a well regulated democracy." — Jolm Marshall. 



JOEDICATKD TO THE TIPPECANOE CLUBS OF THE UMON, 



BY A HARRISON DEMOCRAT. 



SECOND EDITION. 



VVASIIIXGTOXt 

PUBLISHED BY W. M. MORRISON. 
1840. 



P R E F A C E. 



In a review of the political life and opinions of one who has altaincd to the summit of official 
honors in the gift of his countrymen, it is deemed both proper in itself, and a duty we owe to 
the dignity of the office, at least, to give some general description of the authorities from which 
we have derived the facts stated. Of these authorities, that which is entitled, by courtesy, to 
the first notice, is 

"The Life and Political Opinions of Mautis Van Buren, by William M. Holland,'' 
published at Hartford, Ct., 1835, by Belknap & Haniersley. This book was written with the 
avowed object, in part, " to contribute to the political elevation of Mr. Van Buren." In the 
preface, (page ix,) the writer expresses his " great obligations to the Hon. Benjamin F. Butler 
for the ability and zeal with which he has on several occasions defended the character of his dis- 
tinguished friend ;" and tenders his " particular thanks to the Hon. James Vanderpoel, who 
has facilitated the collection of materials for his work," which he professes to submit to the pub- 
lic also as "a contribution to support democratic prinei|)lcs." The liife of Mr. Van Eurcn, thus 
boastfully ushered before the public, and greatly bepraised by the Globe and other party presses 
at the time of its appearance, must have entitled it to be considered authentic and satisfactory to 
the friends of Mr. Van Buren and to himself at the time of its publication. But many of the 
facts stated in this book with the expectation of advancing his ambition then, having at length 
commenced to act against him, have given occasion to some of his friends recently to declare it 
to be "a forgery.'' This attempt, however, to discredit their own production, at this late day, 
has entirely fallen to the ground, as a considerable reward otlered by the editors of the Madison- 
ian for a "forged copy," has failed to produce one, or any evidence of such "forgery." 

"The Political Mirror," (fee, published by .1. P. Peaslee, No. 49, Cedar street, New York, 
1835, has also atibrded an ample source of information, such, too, as is not contained in Hol- 
land's memoir. This is a work of great merit, and bears an internal evidence that traces its 
authorship to one of the most profound statesmen of the present day. It is a magazine of astound- 
ing facta and astute deductions, so extensive in details and admirable in method as to have drawn 
from an eminent Senator the complimentary expression that "it will form the basis of the future 
history of these disjointed times." 

Also, "A Memoir of Martin Van Buren, compri.'-ing an account of the intrigues by which he 
sought and acquired the nomination and election to the oflice of Chief Magistrate, together with 
developments of his political character, by A CiTizr.> of Nkw Yoek, printed by B. \A'. Ro- 
berts, New York, 1828," has afforded us much additional light. 

A large portion of the facts staled are also derived from public documents in the Secretary'sr 
and Clerk's offices of the two Houses of Congress, as well as from various other authentic 
sources, which are referred to, respectively, when the facts are stated. 

We have arranged the whole review in three periods of time. 

The FiKST Pkhiod commences with Master Van Buren's apprenticeship to the study of law 
at 14 years of age, and runs to the time of his attaining a seat in the United States Senate in 
1831, giving a summary of his political tergiversations, his perfidy, and his intrigues for politi- 
cal advancement during that period. 

The Second Peuiod runs from the time of his taking his seat in the Senate till he attained 
to the Presidential chair, as the nominee and successor of General Jackson, giving the com- 
mencement of his efforts, and the history of his success, in transferring the spoils system to the 
General Government; his clandestine devices and influences to facilitate executive encroachmenfi. 
on the other departments of the Government ; and the concentration of all power in the Presi- 
dency before his election to that office, which he confidently anticipated and steadily puisued 
while he was Senator of the United States, Secretary of State, minister to England, and Vice 
President. 

The Third Period exhibits the uses and abuses he has made of those concentrated pow 
ERS, in the short time which has elapsed since his election to the Presidency was consummated, 
by certain clandestine artifices that prostrated the elective franchise of twelve millions of freemen 
at the feet of a military despot in the civic garb, for the benefit of a favorite tolitical autln- 
turer. 

Each of these periods of time are divided into several skctioks, according to the diversity of 
the subjects they embrace, and they reciprocally run into each other as the elucidation of their 
connecting subjects require; so that the third pekioti is for the most part anticipated by the 
recitals and allusions incident to the details of the first and second. 

The whole is premised with an exposition of the principles of true democracy in contradistinc- 
tion from those of s\n ambitious faction who attempt to cheat and decoy the people to their sup- 
port by assuming that honored and popular name. 

Washington, September 15, 1840. 



PRELI.MINAUV 



" We contend for a well-regulaied Democracy." 

[Joh7i Marsliall's speech in the Virginia Convention on the adoption of the Constitution. 



The true Democracy — of Statesmen , Patriots, and lovers of the Constitution — contrasted with 
' the false Democracy of restless, nmbifiotis innovators, and enemies of the Constitution. 

One who professes to labor in the cause of Democracy might well be expected, certainly per- 
mitted, to explain what he conceives to be the true meaning of DtMociiACY, and in what con- 
sists THE Demockatic Cause, particularly as he wholly dissents to the gross perversion of thoso 
term* in latter limes. I will, therefore, previously to entering upon the proper subject of this 
review, devote this rnELiMiXAH v stcnoN to a statement of my seiiiimcnts of these terms, 
showing that they are the same with those of the wisest and purest patriots of the better days of 
the republic, contrasted with those disorganising, revolutionary sentiments of the ambitious, 
upstart, radical, and false pretending "democratic leaders'' of the present degenerate times. 

A Democracy, in the true American sense, is a well-regulated Government of the People, 
through their representatives and agents — from demos, the people, and kraieo, to govern. 

The Dkmocuatic Cause is the cause of Justice in any community, whether between man 
and man individually, or by classes, callings, sections, or associations, legally, geographically, 
or otherwise formed. 

True Democracy is necessarily based upon .Ii'stice, because it is an intrinsic principle of 
human rights, which should be held in strict observance as the indispensable hvi.t. of the differ- 
ent departments of Government in prosecuting the jiublic good, v^hich could not be attained 
without it ; and, especially, it should be unabated in its supremacy over the enactment of laws 
under the Constitution, as well as in the adjudication and tlie administrafion of them. Against 
the cause of Democracy and Justice, which are tlius shown to be identical, it is clear that all 
violent or suilden innovations on the business operations of society are as disparaging and de- 
rogatory, by the indirect operations of such policy in impoverishing some and enriching others, 
as if the property of the one were violently seized and transferred to the other. 

The cause of Justice, then, strictly so considered, is the true Democratic cause, because it 
sustains the equitable interests and rights of all. And whatever inmuvimual, or class, or 
COMBINATION, of socictv may seek, politically to advance his or their interests by wilfully in- 
fringing or disparaging the general interests of the community, is a ijresumptuous monocrat in 
principle, in the individual capacity, and, in the case of the combination, is a faction, a conspi- 
racy, or a despotism of the many over the few, according to the extent of its numbers, and the 
success of the schemes of injustice. 

Having entertained these sentiments for years, upon now reducing them to paper a reminis- 
cence comes upon my mind, that I have high authority for them, as old as our revolutionary 
history, when all our patriotic ancestors, the Revolutioxahy Whigs, were considered and 
treated as Democrats, and the Tories alone were excluded or exempted from the lionor or the 
odium of the ajipellation, as it was held on this or the other side of the Atlantic. It does appear, 
however, that, at a later period, when our present federal Constitution was under discussion in 
the several States for adoption, there were some symptoms of restricting the term Democracy to 
narrower limits: that is, to the friends of the Constitution, for a lime at least, until it became 
the fundamental law of the land ; after which, its veriest enemies may charitably be considered 
as acquiescing Democrats. But during the discussion of (he Constitution, the advocates of its 
adoption, the friends of the Ihv'on, called themselves "Democrats," declaring that "they con- 
tended for a well-regulated Democracy ;" while the opponents of its adoption, the enemies of 
the Union, and advocates of separate 8tate sovereignties, called themselves " State Kights Re- 
publicans." How unjustly the former have been since sligmatized as federal consniidationists 
by the latter, who have at the same time filched from them their good old name of Democrats, 
and appropriated it to themselves, I must for the present leave it to the reader to judge. 

I shall give one or two authorities only, to show how universally the friends of the Constitu- 
tion, previous to its adoption, were considered as the true lovers of Democracy, and how all its 
former friends and foes have, since its adoption, been considered to be uK-CNiTEn as one great 
Democratic Party. 

The immortal John Marshall, that learned jurist and profound statesman, the late Chief Jus- 
tice of the United States, when advocating the merits of the Constitution, in debate on its adop- 
tion in the Virginia Convention, said : 



"Mr Chairman, I conceive that the object of the discussion now before us is, whether democracy or despotisiTj 
be most eligible. I am sure that those who framed the system submitted to our investigation, and those who now 
supporl it, intend the eslablislmient and security of tlie iLirincr. Tlie supporters of the constitution claim tlie title 
of being firm friends of the liberty and the rights of mankind. Tliey say that they consider it as the best means of 
protecting liberty. We, sir, idolize democracy. Tiiose who oppose it [the constitution] have bestowed eulogiums 
on monarchy. tVe prefer tliis system to any monarchy, because we are convinced that it has a great tendency to 
seciire our liberty and promote our happiness. We admire it. because we think it a well-regulated democracy. It 
is recommended to the good people of ihi3 country— they are, through us, to declare whether it be such a plan of 
Gov(':rnment as will establish and secure their freedom. 

" The honorable gentleman (Mr. Henry) has expatiated on the necessity of a due attention to certain maxims— 
10 certain fundamental princitiles from which a free people ought never to depart. I concur with him in the pro- 
priety of the observance of such maxims. They are necessary in any Government, but more essential to a democ- 
racy than to any other. What are the favorite maxims nf democracy ■] A strict observance of JUSTICE and 
PUBLIC FAITH, and a steady adherence to virtue.'— EllioVs Edition Ya. Debates, page 222. 

"There are in this State, and in every S'ate in tlie Union, many who are decided enenjies of the Union. Reflect 
on the probable conduct of such men. What will they do ■? They will bring amendments which are local in their 
nature, and whicli they know will not be accepted. They will never propose such amendments as they think 
would be obtained. Disunion will be their object. We contend for a well-regulated democracy !"— Tij'd., p. 2-24. 

Long after the adojition of the Constitution, r.rid even when party spirit was wrought up to 
the highest state of ferment on merely controversial points, but when all piofessei] to be equal 
friends of tlie Constitution, Mr. Jefferson, in his inaugural address, illustiated our democratic 
political identity in the following appropriate manner. He said : 

" During the contests of opinion through which we have passed, the animation of discussions and of exertions has 
sometimes worn an aspect which might impose on strangers unused to think freely, and to speak and to write what 
they think ; but this being now decided by the voice of th nation, announced according to the rules of the consti- 
tution, all will of course arrange themselves under the will of the law, and unite in common efforts for the common 
good. All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that, though the will of the majortiy is in all cases to pre- 
vail, that will, to be rightful, must be reasonable ; that the minority possess their equal rights, vfhich equal laws 
must protect, and to violate would he oppression. Let us, then, fellow-citizens, unite with one hand and one mind : 
let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which liberty, and even lile itself, are but 
dreary things. And let us reflect that, having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which man- 
kind so lone bled and suffered, we have yet gained little, if we countenance a political intolerance as desjioiic, as 
wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions. During the throes and convulsions of the ancient wcrld, 
during the agonizing spasms of infuriated man, seeking through blood and slaughter his long lost liberty, it was not 
wonderful that the agitation of the billows should reacli even this distant and peaceful shore— that this .shoidd be 
more felt and feared by some and le.'^s by others — and should divide opinions as to measures of safety ; but every dif- 
ference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We liavo called by different names brethren of the same prin- 
ciple. WE ARE ALL REPUBLICANS ; WE ARE ALL FEDERALISTS. If there be any among us who would 
vfish to dissolve this Union, or to change its republican tbrm, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safe- 
ty with which error of opinion may betolerated, where reason is left free to combat it." 

Now is it not obvious, from the solemn asseveration of these eminent men, conspicuous as 
they were for their opposing controversial opinions, that it never entered the heads of our revo- 
lutionary patriots to exclude any portion of the friends of our independence and of the constitu- 
tion from the great political foltl of democracy, ard denounce them as aristocrats, as enemies of 
democracy, as an anti-democratic party, and that, merely because they may have nttained superior 
intelligence, education, ivealth, integrity, and consideration in society ] Nay, who ever dream- 
ed of such injustice until this age of political humbuggery, emanating from a fraudulent and 
wicked " spoils dynasty 1" Will those political quacks and imposters have the inipudcnre to 
pretend that Stephen Girard, in passing from the obscure state of a poor boy to the enviable 
condition of a " millionaire," by his own industry and economy, was at the same time necessa- 
rily transformed into an aristocrat or " an 'enemy to the cause of democracy ]" His whole life 
and his last act in death — his will — fully attest the contrary. He was born and died a demo- 
crat .' The poor logic by which these men would argue the exclusion of the wealth and intel- 
ligence of society from the democratic cause, would operate to the exclusion of Mr. Van Buren 
himself and most of his adherents, who have contrived this humbug to deceive and flatter those 
who may not possess these advantages; but, being considered as constituting the most numerous 
portion of our citizens, would be likely to subserve their political purposes by the success of the 
trick. They also calculate that, by denouncing all the opponents of Mr. Van Buren as enemies 
of the democratic cause, they may decoy many into his ranks on account of their partiality for 
true democratic principles, and may frighten many others from abandoning him, lest they he 
read out of the democratic school. But fortunately for the salvation of the country, the good 
sense of vast numbers is daily undeceiving them by aid of the flood of light that is continually 
revealing the wickedness of his own anti-democratic course, and teaching them that to abandon 
him is the best evidence of their adhesion to the cause of democracy. But let the partisans of 
Mr. Van Buren speak for him and themselves. William M. Holland, his favored biographer, 
explicitly says that all the oppofients of Mr. Van Buren's administration are enemies to democra- 
cy. At page 367, he makes the following precious admissions by way of boasting, viz: 

1. "It may be safely stated that two-thirds of the public presses in this country are opposed to the principles 
of the present administratio7i, 

2. " The PERIODICAL REVIEWS and literary JotJRNALa lea7i against the democratic cause, without a single ex- 
ception. 

3. " Public seminaries of instruction are under the same bias. 

4. " The learned professions are under the same bias. 

5. " And a vast preywnderance of the literary and oratorial talent of the country are under the same bias. 

6. " Wealth, fashion, &c., are, to a great extent, arrayed against the democratic cause. 

" How, then," he vauntingly and significantly asks, " does it happen that the people [minus the above] are guided 
by opposite sentiments ?" 



Presuming thai the rcacier has a curiosity to know what tliese scntiii.'ents are, I placr l)cforc 
him the following hricf extract from the same book, (page 9 of the preface,) where tiiosc senti- 
ments, vvliich have been generally attrihutcJ to the supporters of Mr. Van Buren, anil those of 
liis opponents in relation to them, are clearly contrasted in a few words. He says: 

" III subinitiinL' lo llie jjiiblic this cuniriUiUoii to tlm suppon of dcnmcralic priiitiplrs, the author is wiil aware 
thai hi! shall iidI i srnno tho c:piisiire of those who antii"i])iiie llie ilesiruciioii of all jioliiical auJ religious truth, by 
ihe It.'viiliiig sjiirii (if Jfiiiocraty."' 

He then adds, with levity, that he makes no question of "the sincerity of their melancholy 
forebodings," and displays a frivolous attempt to escape from the just censure to which he al- 
ludes, by alleging that " il', by democracy, you understand" what Mr. Roger Collard says of if, 
he is "well jilca-ed with such democracy." IN'ow the demociacy which Roger Collard speaks 
of, is precisely the democracy which the whole American people aimed at when they adopted 
the constitution, as descriiied in the foregoing extracts from Marshall and JcU'ersort, and ([uitc 
the reverse of ihe destructive schemes of that misnomer ami hundiug tolled " Van Burcn de- 
mocracy," of whose doctrines, in common with hi-j party, the follnwing is a summary, as alleged 
to have been "always cherished by him," on the united authority, direct and indirect, of the 
New York Evening Post, the Bo.vton C^uartcrly Review, the Democratic Review, and the 
Globe, viz: 

I. That " artarchy is but a slite tiflraii.'^ilion." 

-. 'J'hat '■ human rceulatious [law and justicoj prciluce an arlil'icial and unjust ilisirituiiim of iruperiy.'' 
X Thai " the only real enemies b< wiirkinguu^n are their own eMiploycrs.'" 

4. That " wages "are worse than slave labor ;" that " Ihe Northern svsteni of labor is more oppressive than that o( 
the South." 
o. That "universal education is a mockery, and promises no relief for poverty." 
G. That " poveny is only to be remedied by war and bloodshed, of the poor against tlie rich." 

7. That " the sub-Treasury is paving the way for that catastrophe to come up." 

8. Thai " the cause of the inequality of conditions is atiribuiable to relicion and the clerpy." 

9. Thai " the complete and final dt.'siruclion of the clergy is necessary to elevate ilie laboring classes." 

10. Thai " the evils of society are nol to be cured by converting men lo the Christianity of the church." 

II. Thai •'uncompromising hostility to the wholie banking system, and all incorporations, is the 'first step' of 
Iheir reform." 

12. That " every friend to ' corp<iralions' is an enemy to the laborer." 

13. That " heretlilary pn>i'erty is a ^real evil ;" that "at a man's death, his properly must go lo the State." 

1-1. Finally, thai " the rib s ol marnaL'e should be aboli.ohed ;" and cive )i|ace to the licentiousness of Ihe natural 
stale, of coursa 

Of the destructive tendency of the " leveling spirit" of Van Burenism, iiot democracy, ac- 
cording to the sentiments just quoted, we have thousands of evidence ; the very atmosj)here we 
breathe is pregnant with them; the nsdliiliviix cf Van Bunn inidings held in the hearts of 
our cities, previously j)repared by designing leaders, testily to it ; and the sj)eeches by which such 
proceedings are urged in various (piarters, show the direction whence they come. Take the 
single resolution f'om many others like it, pa.-^sed at a Van Buren meeting in l-'hiladelphia not 
a year ago, viz: " 'I'lv.it the doctrine of vested right a is at variance with the democratic princi- 
ple ; that chartered privileges (or corporations) are incompatible with freedom and equality !" 
Take the declaration of Mr. f^enator Wright, of New York, in a speech delivered in his own 
8tale during the last summer, and republished in the Richmond Enquirer, viz: that "we have 
nolo reached the period when it is believed lo be a conimon ciiuoit to suppose that the revolu- 
tion was complete ,•" that " it is timk, therefore, that wc should inquire for tvlieil ii^eis that revo- 
lution U7iderfal>ni ?'' that "it wris lo disnuss niouarrhi/, auistochact, and nKSPoTis.M !" 
Now the drift of all this, and a thousand other similar announcements and proclamations, is too 
obvious to be blinked — we cannot close our eyes up(m them ; if wc do, they are thundered in 
our cars; and if we stutr them iiji lo exclude the odious sound, this rivena>i( of Jacobinism 
haunts our most inward thoughts. We all know that monarchy has been driven from these 
shores — what, then, remains of the enumerated objects above, to complete the revolution, "to 
be dismissed," (or ratiier " lo be despatched" in the technicaliiy of the guillotine,") but the 
" aristocracy," as Mr. Wright terms it, of wealth, intelligence, ami civilization itsell", exemjilitled, 
or rather personified, in the thrifty, iiuluslrious, moral, and religious jiortions of the community ; 
they still " remain," and arc characterizeil by Mr. \\'right as a "despotism yet to be dismissed ;" 
ami "vested rights," by which every man of properly holds his lands, his houses, and other 
cfTccts, are, in set terms, ma<le wax upnn by the Van Buren partisans of Philadelphia and New 
York; in which lalier city diflereiit classes of them have, in advance, adopted the appropriate 
name of in-(fK.-PA W9, arTT-KNnKiis, poixT-KNnKiis, &c. 

All of these and other demonstrations made on the public mind at a distance, are but emana- 
tions from the central executive machinery at Washington, where public seiitiment is manufac- 
tured by a conclave under the superinlendence of Amos Kendall, and the clandestine intluenco 
of Mr. Van Bukf.:». Some of the out givings of thaiy»»/a were made by Amos Kendall and 
Mr. Benton, in short speeches at the Hickory Club festival given on the olh December, 1S32. 
Among other things in the same strain, Kendall said : 

" The United States hai r iheir voun;: nobility system, tl.i head is ihe Bank of the rniied States ; its right arm, 
a protecting tarift'and manufacturing monopolies ; its left, crowing State debts and State incorporations." 

Thus, in a breath, and with that imperial brevity so out of place as to cast an air of the bur- 
lesque upon it, tJoes Amos Kendall and his a.'sociates and prompter put under the bans of the 



6 

Federal Government, our whole system of import duties, manufactures, Stale negotiations for 
internal improvements, and State incorporations of every description, of which corporate insti' 
tutions the flourishing and provident State of Pennsylvania alone has upwards of two hundred- 
The New York Review for the month of July, in an article on the Constitutional History of 
Greece, as I learn from the National Intelligencer of the 15th August, speaks volumes on this 
subject, of which I subjoin an extract, which is a brief but pointed illustration of our own case, 
viz: 

" TnucYDiDEs has sketched the whole philosophy of a ' reign of terror,' the mystery oi constructive majorities, 
by which a few bold and crafty spirits dictitte their own opinions to the nuiliitudes they affect to obey, and measures 
opposed by almost every individual of a great mass are seemingly adopted with perfect unanimity, in a few words, 
as exactly descriptive of certain recent events as if they had been expressly intended as a history of them It is 
curious to see what is called, by the political wire-drawers of the day, ' party discipline,' or, in plain English, the 
art of thinking/or the people, as familiar to the demagogues of antiquity as to those even of this privileged age." 

And yet, what most unequivocally points out the origin and concert of action I have just 
adverted to, (which can be ftilly proved by a committee vested with power to send for persons 
and papers,) is the fact, that Mr. Van Buren has, in the last paragraph hut one of his late mes- 
sage at the commencement of the present Congress, virtually endorsed this very denunciation of 
Kendall's against all Slate incorporations ; to accomplish (he overthrow of which he invokes the 
spirit of revolution, per fas aut nefas, peaceably, if it can be so accomplished, but forcibly, and 
by torrents of blood, if necessary. His words are : 

" To remove the influences which had thus gradually grown up among us— to deprive them of their deceptive 
advantages— tn test them by the light of wis3om and ti-uth — to oppose the force which they concentrate in their 
support— all this was necessarily the work of time, even anion? a people so enlightened and pure as that of the 
United States. In most other cuuntries, perhaps, it could only be accomplished through that series of revolutionary 
movements, which are too often found necessary to effect any great and radical reform; but it is the crowning 
merit of our institutions, that they create and nourish, in the vast majority of our people, a disposition and a power 
peaceably to remedy abuses which have elsewhere caused the effusion of rivers of blood, and the sacrifice ot thou- 
sands of the human race. The result thus far is must honorable to the self denial, the intelligence, and tho 
patriotism of our citizens; it justifies the confident hope that they will cany through the reform which has been so 
well begun, and that they will go still farther than they have yet gone in illustrating the important truth, that a 
peojile as free and enlightened as ours, will, ichenever it becomes necessary, show themselves lo be indeed capable 
of self-government, by voluntarily adopting appropriate remedies fov every abuse, and submitting to temjiorary 
sacrifices, however great, to insure their permanent welfare-'' 

I grant that this endorsement is made in Mr. Van Buren's accustomed indirect, parenthetical, 
and equivocal manner, not so easily comprehended by the generality of readers, except by the 
aid and comparison of correlative facts; but upon viewing the whole connexion, it is easy to per- 
ceive the ardent purpose so concealed, and for which, if any thing, he should be held the more 
re.sponsible. The confirmations, also, of this purpose of revolution, were they wanted, are 
abundantly supplied by the subsequent acts of his despotic majorily in the two Houses of Con- 
gress, in destroying the business corporations of this District as a commencement, in attempting 
to disgrace the States' internalimprovement stock by refusing to assume their debts unasked, and 
in attempting to establish a standing army of 200,000 men, under the pretence of regulating 
the militia, but to revive the sedition law by the application of the army regulations to the voters 
throughout the country, to the extent of the two-hundred thousand militia so intended to be 
brought under the army regulations. 

If these few facts, selected from thousands (hat miglit be recited, are niit sufficient to prove 
the settled purpose of revolution, till an authentic investigation by a committee of Congress 
may have an opportunity to do so, I will here add only one other ex-officio manouvre to throw 
further light ujion it. 

Amos Kendall, late Postmaster General, who has been authorized to withdraw from the cabi- 
net expressly to launch upon an editorial crusade against the elective franchise of the people, in 
order to accomplish the re-election of Mr. Van Buren, has, in the 3d numlier of the extra 
Globe, issued a bulletin, of a column in length, addressed to all those of our fellow-citizens 
whom he pleases to denominate " democrats" — whom, on a previous occasion, in his circular 
petitioning for subscri[)tions to his paper, he defined to be "farmers, mechanics, and working- 
men," excluding all other citizens from that honor. In his bulletin, he says : 

" Fourth op July.— It becomes democrats this year to go into the celebration of our great anniversary, not with 
hilarity and mirth, but with solemnity and fervor." They should go into it with something of the feeling which our 
forefathers did in 1778 and 1779, when the British hirelings were attempting lo quench the flame of liberty in the 
best blood of America," &,c. &c. 

" Let democrats reflect on these things as they go to celebrate the Fourth of July. Let the reflection make them 
serious and thoughtful. Let them remember the pledges of their forefathers to each other, on this sacred day in 1777- 
'78-'79-'oU-'81," &c. " Let this remembrance inspire them with the resolution of their fath-ers, and induce them to 
swear their fathers' oath, to live free or die." " It is not now they are called on lo defend their liberty in fields of 
blood. Through your own right of suffrage, democrats of America, the enemy attacks you, and in that is your 
present defence. Your weapons are as yet those of peace, and by a resiilute use of them, the occasion for resort to 
other m^ans of defence may be forever averted. But should you, by listleness and indifference, suiTer the enemy 
to get possession of your Government, of its Treasury, and its army, you may not be able hereafter to place 
In Congress, in the Executive chair, or even in your Slate Legislatures, the representatives of your choice," &c. &c. 

" Swear on the Fourth of July to avert that catastrophe." " Band together, and prepare to March to the polls, not 
with arms, or knives, or clubs, to beat and butcher your fellow-citizens, but with hearts firmly resolved, by an honest 
and independent exercise of the right of suffrage, to avert the possible necessity of marching hereafter in battle 
array to put down usurpation I !" 

The possible election of General Harrison is, then, by this miscreant, Kendall, made the oc- 
casion to excite the partisans of Mr. Van Buren, to prepare, ?n that event, to march "in Imttle 



array" to put down ^'usurpation .'" as lif presumes to stigmatize the success ol him or any 
one else at the polls, over Mr. Van Bureri ! Is not this an avowal that the present pariy of 
oHice-hoMers already claim the Goveniiiiont as thuiii own ; and that they propose, and are 
preparing, to delend its possession, wrrii hlood and civil wau ! if they can put a sufficient 
number of the peo[>lc in the mood, in addition to the means of the "Treasury and the army" 
already in their hands — nay, that Mr. Van Buren himself has authorized, and is responsible for 
this threat? If any one doubts this, let him bear in mind that this bulletin was issued a few 
days before the passage of the sub-Treasury bill legalizing their po.session of the Treasury, in 
all probability to stimulate ihe party slaves in the House where the bill had slept, and to encour- 
age them with the belief that such an appeal would have a good effect on their drooping cause at 
the polU. Let him also bear in mind, that though the bill was passed two or three days before 
the Fourth of July, that hallowed day, at 12 o'clock, was desecrated and disgraced by Mr. Van 
Buren, to sign the bill, as " another declaration of independence !" and that the arrangement 
was so announced in advance by the (Jlobe, for stage effect, at the celebrations of the anniver- 
sary, as far as the announcement could reach, in time — and that it was so glorified in Philadel- 
phia by the pahtt. Also let him remember that Mr. Van Buren is the very man who returned 
his cordial thanks to a committee of Philadelphia Van Buren men, a year or two ago, " for the 
offer of 10,000 minute men armed and equipped as his Jirst legion, to execute his orders issued 
or to be issued ! !" and if all these things do not satisfy him of what is intended, if they dare, 
I should say, his dulness of apprehension taken his liberty is in danger, but thk better fits 
itl.M FOR A PALACE SLAVE !! Here is a copy of the resolution and the letter of thanka 
alluded to : 

" 1. Resolved, Thai the more effectually lo uphold the constitutional Government of our choice and of our love ; 
to secure the ri^id enforcing of the laws ol Congress, and ilie orders of the Executive, either now? issued, or which 
may hereafter tie issued : for the preservation and protection of the public lands from the grasp of speculators, and 
oecuring the nalioix its consiiiuiituial specie currency j lo protect United States officers in the discharee of iheir 
public duties, and at Ihe same time the public peace from outrage: We, the sovereign people, do hold ourselves 
ready lo organize in this city and county of Philadt^lphia, a first volunteer Irgion often thousand men, m be aa 
shortly as possillf fully armed and enuipped, thf same lo tie called The Philadelphia United States .Minute ^len." 

[For this pledge of support, Presideni Van Buren returned his ' sincere acknowledgments' in the following 
letter :] 

'• Washington, May 29, 1837. 

" Gbntlemen;— I have the honor lo acknowledge the receipt of your letter communicating to me ihe proceed- 
ings of a large meeting of the citizens of the city and county of Phil.idelphia, without distinction of party, held in 
Indexiendence Square,"'on lhe22d instant. 

" It is eraiifyine to me to learn from those proceedings, that the course pursued by myself and those associated 
with me In the Executive branch of the Government, upon the important subjects of the currency, foreign trade, 
and the public lands, receives ihe cordial approbation of so meritorious and respectable a portion of my fellow- 
oitizens. 

" For this expression of their confidence and good will, and for the accompanying pledge of support and co- 
operation in upholding the authority of the constitution and laws, I beg you to make lo those you represent my 
sincere acknowledgineiiis. 

" Thanking you, sentlemen, for the flatterins and friendly manner in which you have perfonnul the duty assign 
ed to you, I am, very rei-peclfuUyjyour obedient servant, M. VAN BUREN" 

" To Messrs. F. Stoever, I.sbaei. Youno, and Joseph Dean.'' 

Though the foregoing classification of Mr. Van Buren's supporters, as embracing the farmers, 
mechanics, and workitigmen, be in a very material degree false — yet it shows what desperate as- 
sumptions the party can resort to, in claiming for their supporters the most numerous classes of 
society, in order, if possible, to flatter and win them to their desperate cause, under the captiva- 
ting banner of democracy, as if these classes constituted the whole democracy or exclusive demo- 
crats, and could dispense with all other classes and callings in society as drones, intruders, and 
nuisances. Whereas, on the contrary, does not the good sense of the farmer?, mechanic.-?, and 
working men, teach them that a well-organized cominunily must have the aid of the learned 
professions, lawyers, doctors, divines, the merchants, tradesmen, factors, and transporters, em- 
bracing the whole of our shipping community, &c. &c., whose services, at moderate fees, or 
commissions, enable the former to prosecute their farming and other labors, and thereby econo- 
mize time and profits in their several pursuits, upon the simple principle and first elements of 
political economy so admirably illustrated by Adam ISmith, in his dissertation on " the division 
of labor?" 

But the truth i.s, that this classification of their party supporters is a wholesale calumny. 
The real substratum of their party is composed oi the TKXiiTS of Tom Paine, Fanny Wright, 
Robert Dale Owen, Orestes A. Brownson, and Wm. .M. Holland, cementeJ by the promise ol 
sub-Treasury spoils. Independent, however, of this cement, I grant that the captivating licen- 
tiousness of those doctrines has seized upon the ardent passions of many inconsiderate persons, 
and that a vast many others are deceived by the catchwords of *' democracy" and "the largest 
liberty," not heeding whither the siren notes of their seducers would lead them ; while the true 
democracy of the country, that is, "the advocates of a well-regulated democracy," are utterly 
opposed to their destructive schemes, and are prepared to cast their votes for Hahhison ank 
demochaci against Van Buuen ano .mo.nahcht. 



In connexion with the above exposure of the gratuitous classification of Van Buren radical 
Deinocracy, and their revolutionary doctrines, propagated under specious deceptions, it is proper 



now, in order to bring us up to the point of dcpartu re, or commencement of this hjeview, to re- 
call the attention of the reader to the fact that Mr. Van Buren's biographer, William M. Hol- 
land, Esq., also virtually assumes the same cla.ssification of his supporters, as composing tlierea/ 
people, the DEMocnAcr of the country, to the exclusion of many other important classes and 
callings of society, as we have seen ; and'that he declares that there is "a wonderful harmony 
subsisting between the members of said party." He then goes on to explain how and wherefore 
this harmony is produced — which is so pregnant with meaning, more than meets the eye at a 
superficial view, that I shall here transcribe it for reflection. At page 359 he says : 

" But the triiG cause of llie surprising harmony that exists between the President [Jackson] and the people is 
either not understood by the anti-democratic party, or is misrepresented. The truth is, (says he,) that the Presi- 
dent has been sustained in his measures, because ttiey have all been based upon a careful observation and thorough 
knowledge of the popular will. He has collected and embodied the 'wishes of the people ; lie has felt himself con- 
stantly to be their agent and minister ; and, if he has seemed to lead public opinion, it has been because he is en- 
dued with the penetration which has enabled him to foresee its current, and, by throwing himself at its head, to 
ring its full force to sustain him." 

With an eye to the machinery for the manufacture of public sentiment, established by an official 
junta at Washington, to which I have already alluded, (but which can never be fully exposed, 
except by a committee of investigation, disembarrassed of the impediments of the present Exec- 
utive, who is interested in its concealment, after the example of his predecessor in defeating the 
investigations of other committees,) it is plain that, in so '* collecting and enihudi/itig" the wishes 
of the people, as here alleged, a portion of Executive leaven might easily have been thrown in 
to ferment and modify their intrinsic character, and thereby derive their true origin from the 
Executive wishes, in bringing their full force to sustain liimself. But, especially of Mr. Van 
Buren, our author, page 362, says : 

" No instance ot bad faith, no example of double dealing, no act of duplicity or disengenuousness has ever been 
fastened upon HIS political cha.ra.cleT. His friends challenge the strictest i^cniuny on this point, and invite the 
most, unscrupulous exposure." " The public will not he satisfied witli vague general charges— proof must be given 
of specific acts." " Without such proof, the common sense of mankind will be slow to believe that his regular and 
steady progress towards the highest honors of the Government, through a long course of public service, is ascribable 
to the loic artifices of dnplicity and cunning." "His success as a political leader will rather continue to be as- 
cribed to the superiority of his genius, the extent of his attainments, the intrinsic excellence of his character, a7id 
to his admirable knoioledge of men. His clear perception of truth, his predominating sood sense, the honesty of 
his own motives, and iiis sagacity in detecting the motive.s of others, have indeed endowed him with a rare 
talent of harmonizing, concentrating, and DIRECTING the varied feelings and exertions of the members 
OP a great party." 

A party ! so constructed I as we have seen I Yes, he does harmonize, concentrate, and direct 
that MiSEHABLF, PAiiTT ; SO that, out of a great deal of fustian, we have come to some truth, at 
least. And, taking the following from the same concluding chapter 26th, page 355, we find 
the like mixture of truth, with an attempt to impose a gratuitous assertion upon the credulity of 
his readers who are not better informed, and ending, indeed, with a precious avowal. He says: 

" The firm belief of the writer in the most ultra democratic doctrines, and his partiality towards the subject of 
this narrative, as the champion of those doctrines, he has not any where affected to conceal." (He says) " No doubt 
this strong bias of his mind has led him to lake views of certain public events widely different from those which are 
enlenained by persons of an opposite political faith. He has, however, strenuously endeavored not to distort, con- 
ceal, or misrepresent facts. The incidents (says he) of Mr. Van Buren's life have been fairly slated, and his opin- 
ions fully displayed." " The friends of Mr. Van Buren (he continues, page S.")6) ascribe his remarkable elevation 
to superior ability and virtue ; his enemies charge it to intrigue and accident. It appears, however, to be universally 
admitted that he is endowed with extraordinary abilities of some kind." (But, says he) " During many of the ear- 
liest yearo of his public life, he was' denied not only honesty Init ability. In regard to the latter endowment, the 
mouth of calumny has been etfeclually stopped." " With regard to his integrity and patriotism, and the accordance 
of his political principles with the true interests of his country, a similar unanimity of opinion cannot, in the present 
generation, be expected." 

The reader doubtless perceives, from these evidences respecting the classification of partisan 
supporters; their doctrines ; the measures taken io collect and embody their wishes; the skill of 
their present leader in harmonizing, concentrating, and directing such a party ; the admissions 
impugning his honesty and ability in early life, and avowing the present want of unanimity of 
opinion in regard to his integrity, his patriotism, and the accordance of his political principles 
with the true interests of his country — that much light is gained towards a clear comprehension 
of the bill of indictment and specifications which I now propose to give in outline. In tlie course 
of its rehearsal, the reader will also be prepared to discern how admirably Mr. Van Vuren's de- 
fective education, his native cunning, and the tortuous course of his political life, adapted him 
for that con.nimmate imposture by which he has frequently supplanted his political rivals, or, 
when failing to do so, has given in his adhesion to them for ulterior views, and has finally captured 
the Presidency, as if filched by legerdemain, from the bewildered sesses of a deceived 
People! His biographer, page 15, says that — 

"After acquiring the niJiments of an English education, he became a student in the academy in his native vil- 
lage," where " he made considerable progress in the various branches of English literature, and sjained some knowl- 
edge of Latin. It may be inferred, however, [continues he, and sucli an admission in such a place renders it 
certain,] that all these acquisitions were not great in amount, as lie left the Academy when but fourteen years of 
age to begin the study of his profession." [Note.^" The period of study preparatory to admission to the bar was 
seven years for candidates who, like the subject of this memoir, had not llie benefit of a collegiate education." (Page 
26.) So that, to make up the defects of education, liis cue was, to take lime by line forelock", with a fraud upon the 
legal regulation in the case, by affecting to commence liis legal studies at fourteen, (which is ridiculous,) in order to 
evade the legal disability to be admitted to the bar at the ace of 21, in which he nevertheless succeeded.] "Such 
(says eur author, page 16) wafl the preparation with which Marlin Van Buren, at the age of fourteen years, com- 



nienced the siiidy of law." [Upon which he exriaimaj " What an encouraging example does his subseqiieni stic- 
CPS3 nresenl to the younc men of our counirj' ! Few," snyg he, '• are denied advantapes of education equal to those 
which he possessed." 

He then says : 

" It is an interesting matter of speculation to conjecture what would have been the effect of a reijiilar education, 
80 called, ujxin the mind of the sulgect of this memoir f He has shown himself to be a profound reasimer, at least, 
in his profession ; yet he probaldy Knew little in early lile of the rules nf locic, or of the mrlaphysical disquisitions 
which have pmfessed to teach the art of thinking, fioni the days of Thides to those of Thomas Brown. He evinces 
freedom, accuracy, and ccjiioiisiirss in the use ol (the Knclish) lanpuitpe ; yet he had, as we have seen, but a sliclil 
acquaintance with any of the lanpuajesof antiqnity. He has acquired habits of patient and accurate research, but 
not from the diacrams'of Kucliil, ur the my.'lic steps of analytic mathematics. 

" Such e.xauiplcs of distinEoisliid success" (continues our "infaiuated author) " oucht, perhaps, to excite some more 
thnrouph inquiry into the usefulness [or uselessmss !] in all cases, of oiiri>rdinary routine nf studies." 

" Some persons jiossi ss, beyond a doubt," (says he^ " strung natural aptitudes to excel in ceilaiii departments, and 
frreat natural inability to reach even moderate excellence in others. Ought not a true system of education [the 
Van Buren system] to turn the peculiar [xiwers of the pupil to the best account, and to waste no time in attempting 
to render him a proficient in tliose branches of science, literature, or an, for which he has neiilu r capacity nor in- 
clination 1 If SI), is lint that system of qursliiuiable utility wliich forces every student, at a unifrm pace, tlirc.iiLii 
the same round of nialhenuitical and classical discipline, without reference to the peculiar tendencies of his native 
talents ? 

" Again :" (says he, page IS,) " in most of our higher seminaries, the same course of instruction, the same text- 
books, the same princqiles in literature, science, and the arts, are presented, year after year, to successive genera- 
tions." " it is not unreasonable to suppose, that young minds, thus moulded uixin a uniform system, will generally 
fall into common and uniform habits ot ihoocht, and will be led to leajon, believe, and act precisely as their fathers 
anil teachers liavo reasoned and believi d lit fure lliem. The strong tendency of tlie system is to repress inquiry and 
original investigation, to eradicate every idii syncracy of intellect, and merely to infuse into a passive mind the 
views which have been passively received by {hose who teach them ! To this' kind of discif.line IMartin Van Bu- 
ren w;is never subjected ! Whether to his advantage or loss can only be a matter of conjecture ! !" 

Whether to his advnntitge or loss can only be matter of conjccttirc'! Grant you, Messrs. 
Holland, Butler, and Vanderpocl, at least in 1835, when your glorification of Van Buren was 
j)ublished, and when the lights of parallel cases of the wild weeds of innovation and disorder 
that are wont to spring up in the uncultivated soil of ardent and restless minds, only pointed 
out the protiabic grounds of conjecture ; but now, in 1840, facts and their consequences have been 
developed in sutiicient abtindance "to satisfy the world" that, if such want of "dit-cipiine in tiie 
principles anil doctrines of our ' forefathers,' " which a reguUr education would have taught him, 
did not redound to his own individual loss, by eradicating the " idiosyncracies of his intellect" 
and " repressing their native propensity" to inflict iiinuvalidii and dhordtr upon our long-ap- 
proved system of Government, tlie calamities which these undisciplined propensities of his idio- 
-syncracy of intellect have brought on the country, through a course of wild e.xperimenl.s, con- 
ceived by the wliim of an untutored mind, like that of Ph.etox, aspiring to ride in and conduct 
the chariot of the sun, do most fully declare at whose cost the experiments of Mahtin Yan 
BviiEx have since been made, and add one more to the thousands of lessons by which poor hu- 
man nature has been taught never to entrust itself to the vagaries of a wild, visionaiy mind, un- 
disciplined in ethics, morality, and rehgion, unbalance by contemplating the beautiful symmetry 
and unchangeable consistency of the physical sciences, so tvell culculated to curb the political 
adventurer, and to keep him witiii> the iiou.nds of prvdenck, A\n the ArenovEi) expe- 
KiExcE OF WISER HEADS AND BETTER PATRIOIS, 



FIRST PERIOD. 



" Even at that early age, to:^, [fol-hteen, when he commencep the studv of law,] "Sir. Van Buren is rep- 
resented, Ijy those wiio knew liioijto have had a spirit of ohsi rvatiun, with regard \.o public events, a.\\A \.\\c personal 
disposittoiu and characters of those around him, which gave an earnest of his future profieitntcy in the sciemce 
OF POLITICS and of the human he art." 

[ fMlund's Life and Political Opinions of Martin Van liiiren, page, 16. 



I. Mr. Vun Barents had fdilli, dmthlc dcalinir^ and di!iin^cviiou/'nc.<:ss, CTeinptlfii'd in the 
case of his conduct to Dc Witt Clinton .■ — united with the Hudson and Hartford Convention 
Federalists in opposition to Mr. Madison and the late war uu;ainst England .• — Kufus King, 
James A. Hamilton, S^c, his political coadjutors. 

Mr. Van Buren's biographer, William M. Holland, Esq., whether hired or v(dunteered in the 
cause of his glorilication, says : " IN'o instance of bad faith, no (•:^am|)le of double dealimr, no 
act of duplic ty or disingenuousness, has ever been fastened upon his political character;" and 
then challenges his op[)onents to "the strictest scrutiny." .Mr. Holland falls far c.iort of sus- 
taining this exemption, as his own book alTords many evidences sufficiently (subversive of his 
assertion, even without further scrutiny and reference to other authorities abundantly at hand. 

It is charged on Mr. Van Buren by a respectable citizen of his own State, and confirmed by 
another, both of whom know his history intimately well, and are personally known to the writer 
of this review, that "his whole political life is stamped with inconsistency, treachery, and dis- 
simulation ;" and that "his most liberal proffers of friendsliip have been swiftly followed by per- 



10 

secution and neglect." Of the truth of this, many illustrations have been given in the political 
writings of both. Let a few instances in the case of his game of "fast and loose" with De 
Witt Clinton suffice, viz: In 1812, Mr. Van Buren was in habits of confidential and friendly- 
intercourse with Mr. Clinton, and supported his nomination for the Presidency against Mr. 
Madison; (a fad of general notoriety, and admitted by Holland, page 90.) In 1813, after 
the defeat of Mr. Clinton, when his popularity proved an insufficient ladder for Mr. Van Buren 
to rise by, the latter "changed front," and became the advocate of Mr. Madison and the war. 
(Same authority, luith much boasting, pages 90, 91.) During several years Mr. Van Buren 
had opposed Clinton's scheme of connecting the waters of Erie and the Hudson by a canal bear- 
ing their name, and finally, on the 13th April, 181H, accomplished the defeat of a bill appropri- 
ating $350,000 a year during eight years, for that object. — (Memoir of Martin Va7i Buren by 
a citizen of New York, page 20, and his opposition to it acknowledged by Holland page 93.) 
In 1817, Mr. Van Buien having failed through seven years' exertions to destroy the popularity 
of Mr. Clinton, adopted the temporizing course of wearing a double front, one for Clinton's 
friends and one for his own, at a legislative caucus held in Albany for the nomination of Gov- 
ernor. He had, through his organ, the Albany Argus, recommended "toleration and liberality" 
among those who "may receive and reciprocate favors." He had procured it to be precon- 
certed among his friends, that, should Mr. Clinton be nominated, they (his friends) should rise 
and retire from the body. But at that conjuncture, when the ballots had been counted, showing 
a majority in Clinton's favor, Mr. Van Buren rose, and, to the utter confusion and astonishment 
of his co-partisans, moved that the nomination be unanimous. But the minority retired accord- 
ing to agreement, and left Van Buren with his new political associates. — (^Memoir of Martin 
Van Buren by a citizen of New York, page 25.) In 1818, he again forsook Mr. Clinton, 
after discovering that tlie " toleration and liberality" recommended by his press, the Albany Ar- 
gus, had not produced its intended effect; for, " so far from Mr. Clinton's 'reciprocating the 
favors he had received,' he would hardly extend to him a cold civility." But the humiliating 
reflection to Mr. Van Buren that he had nothing to expect from the confidence of Mr. Clinton, 
in one who had thus suddenly abandoned his own party, did not prevent him from undertaking 
the forlorn enterprise of "worming himself again into their confidence," which he accomplished 
by becoming the advocate of the Hudson and Erie canal. — (See same Memoir, Sfc., pages 28, 
39.) Finally, on the occasion of the sudden death of Mr. Clinton, when Mr. Van Buren had 
attained to a seat in the Senate of the United States, he seized upon this favoiable position to 
become the eulogist of that great statesman before the congregated intelligence of the nation. 
"Notwithstanding all the circumstances of his ungrateful and base treatment of him, and the 
strong sympathies which his untimely end must have inspired in every breast, Martin Van Bu- 
ren ventured to improve the opportunity to recover the standing he had lost, by an effort to turn 
the sympathies of the people to his own account." "In rising to announce the death of a favorite 
son and idolized statesman, before the assembled talents of a great people, he dissembled a spirit 
of deep humility; he professed to have consigned to the same grave with his illustrious fellow- 
citizen, all his feelings of animosity; and painted his chaiacter in the most pathetic and enga- 
ging colors, for which he had artfully prepared himself." "The single fact,'"' said he, "that the 
greatest public improvement of the age in which we live was commenced under the guidance of 
his councils and splendidly accomplished under his immediate auspices, is of itself sufficient to Jill 
the ambition of any man, and to gii^e glory to any name." "This seemingly amazing mag- 
nanimity and disinterestedness of their Senator, who was known to have been the deadly foe of 
their deceased son, had the wonderful effect that was anticipated. The same tide upon which 
Clinton hod been elevated, in opposition to every efTort of Van Buren, secret or open, was im- 
mediately mounted by him, and on which he was drifted to the highest honors of the State;" 
[being shortly a'ter elected Governor to succeed Clinton. ] — (-See the same Memoir, pages 32, 33. ) 
On the 22il May, 1813, Mr. Madison was nominated for re-election to the Presidency by a 
Congressional caucus at Washington ; and, on the 29th of the same month, a federal caucus 
of the New lork Legislature, held at Albany, nominated De Witt Clinton to oppose him and 
the war measure,* of course, then in contemplation. This nomination, we have seen, Mr. Van 



* Benjamin F. Buller, Esq. (then Auorney General of the United Slates, and now United States Attorney for the 
city of New York) did, in an electioneering letter dated in March, 1835, addressed to Hu?h A. Garland, then a 
member of the Virginia Leeislalure, and since elected Clerk of the House of Representatives Uy the locofocoes as 
the further fit instrmiienl of their party, undertakes •' to deny that there is any thing in the mei-p fact of Mr. Van 
Buren's support of Mr. Clinton (right or wrone) ' under the circumstances staled,' to sustain the imputation of 
opposition to the war." (See Holland, p. 91.) 'Now, though this is a gratuitous presumption in face of the fact 

g roved upon Mr. 'Van Buren by indisputable testimony afready cited, yet I cannot but note lis affinity to Mr, 
.iichie's pliant doctrine, that there is nothing in his mere opposition to Mr. Van Buren's principal measures of 
the sub Treasury, the army of 200,0fi0 men, &c., to justify the inference that consistency should array him against 
the man. I know of no one who believes with Mr. Ritchie, unless Mr. Buller does— and of the sincerity of Mr. 
Butler's opinion in such a matter, "uniler the circumstances," the reader may form some jiidirment, when he is 
informed that Mr. Buller, while Attorney General, frequently' retracted his official opinions at the cnmmand of 
General Jackson, and elaborated opposite ones to suit the President's taste or passion. The ca^e of the Baltimore 
and Washington rail-road is one in point. The company desired that ihe road should connfict with the canal- 
It was referred to the Attorney General, who gave his opinion in favor of the company's rieht to do so. General 



11 

Buren not merely "concurred in the propriety of supportinp," as avoweil by his biographer, but 
took a very active part, in secret concert, widi his then federal coadjutors, James A. Hamilton 
and others, to consummate it by rendering Mr. Madison un()opular, under ihcir violent denunci- 
ations of his war measure, declaied the Juno following. The author of the "Memoir of Mr. 
Van Ikiren," above referred to, says, (page 12,) "Immediately after the declaration of \v;ir, the 
federal partv in Van Buren's county, by his special recommendation and personal contrivance, 
held a meeting which was managed altogether by his 'direction ;' and, on the Slh day of July 
following, the federalists published their address and resolutions,' signed by James ,\. Hamilton 
and others of Mr. Van Buren's creed of politics at the lime, of which this is as ample: 

" BesolveJ, That ihe war is impolilic, unnecessary, and disastrous; and thai to employ Iho miluia in offi-nsive 
war [that is, to enter Canaila] is unconsiitmionul." 

In further illustration of certain changes of positions on the political chess board, it may be 
well here to remark that, while Mr. Van Buren and hi.s fedcrid colleagues of that day were thu;* 
opposing Mr. Madison and the war with vituperative vir\ilence, Mr. Ritchie, editor of the Rich- 
mond Enquirer, was, with equ.sl zeal, fupportiiig that illustrious father of the constitution and 
the war. In proof of this, I cite the following fact, viz: that, in reporting the proceedings of a 
republican caucus of the Virginia Legisl.iture, held at Richmond on the 12th February, 1812, 
to nominate electors for President, at which Andrew Stevenson, Esq., now minister to England, 
was chairman, and Thomas Ritchie, Esq., editor of the Enquirer, was secretary, Mr. Ritchie 
suid of the caucus : 

" But one sentiment rtigned through the meeting ; which was, "to oite ax unditideii 
SCPPOHT TO Mil. MAnisox." — {See report of proceedings of that day.) 

Though Mr. Van Buren did, after the <iefeat of Mr. Clinton by the re-election of Mr. Madi- 
son, give his support to bis a imiuistration and the war generally, yet, as an additional evidence 
of his vacillating course in this as well as the rest of his career, the Senate's Journal of New 
York, for September, 1814, shows that he opposed the raising of troops, under the recommenda- 
tion of Governor Tompkins, to aitl in the war. 

In 1819, Mr. Van Buren successfully advocated the election of Rufus King to the United 
States Senate, and, in a letter to a friend during the canvass, " pledged his head on the propri- 
ety of supporting .Mr. King." " Yet," sat/^ the author nf the Memoir of Martin Van Buren, 
page 29, " at that session of the Legislature, in 1819, he (Mr. Van Buren) pn fessed great 
hostility to Mr. King and his federal Iriends; and accused De Witt Clinton and his friends of 
the political degeneracy of favoring the election of Rufus King, and thereby endangering the 
power, and assailing the principles, of the demociatic party." I also fnid a virtual confirmation 
of the strongest feature of this statement in Holland's Life of Van Buren, pp. 143-'4'1, where 
he speaks of "an extract from what [)urports to have been a private letter of Mr. V. B. to a 
political friend." Holland s:iys : " \\'hcther this extract is uuthcniic or fahe is unknown to 
the present writer." So important a matter was it (in a work gotten up for the avowed purpose of 
glorifying Mr. Van Buren) to set this affair right, that no one can believe the panics interested, in 
aftbrding the materials of information to the liiogriipher, would have failed to contradict it if they 
could : therefore, we may understand the policy of permitting the authenticity or falsehood of 
it to remain uurnowx to him. He then, by sheer bravado, gives the extract as the oidy doc- 
ument, of any kind, which the enemies of Mr. Van Buren have been able to adduce against 
him, which he "leaves, without comment, to the judgment of the reader," viz: 

" 1 should sorely regret to find any flagjing on the sulijeci nf Mr. King- We [the Albany regency] are committed 
to his support. It is boih wise and honest: and we njusl have no fluttering in our course. Mr King's views to- 
wards us are honoraMe and correct. The Missouri Cjiifstion conceals, so far as he is concerned, no plot, and we 
shall give it a true dinciion. You know what the feelings and views of our friemls were, whcrj I saw you ; and 
you know what we then conclud. d to do. My " Considerations," &c , and the aspect of ihc Albany Argus, will 
show you that we have entered on the work In earne.si. We cannot, therefore, look back. Let us nu't, then, have 
any halting. I will put my head on its propriety." 

We shall presently see that Mr. Holland, in the same cliapter, p. 146, admits that Mr. Van 
Buren, after Mr. King's election, united in the instructions of the New York Legislature to 
their Senators against the admission of Missouri, except under a negation of her right to hold 
slaves. And in regard to the authenticity of the above e.rtract, the author of the "Memoir," 



Jackson returned the opinion to Mr. Butler for reconsideration, and Mr. Butler then gave an elaborate opinion to 
the contrary— which stopped the railroad about 100 yards short of the canal. By the way, in reference to >Ir. Gar 
land's .igonry in maknig fair weather for Mr. Van liuren in Virginia, and his subsequent call to Washington as 
Clerk to ihe House, it appears to nie that it would bf a good rule, whenever wc see a conspicuous locnfoco brought 
before the public, as the orian of an electioneering movement at Washington, to look fir him si S"lecied, to malio 
a figure in some high office shonly afierwants. Mr. Hugh A. Garland was selected by the junta here as a ht person, 
from his radicalism and activity in the Virginia Legislature, to do a special party service in his State; and he per- 
formed his task no doubt, so much to their satisfaction, that a special niessenser was afterwards despatched to him, 
to invite him to come to Washington and be a candiilate for the clerkship ofthe House— an importani office for a 
party who is disposed to abuse it. Every body knows the efTcient pan the Clerk took in setting aside the return- 
ed niembers from New Jersey, at the com'mencemfni of the last session. Without his act, (which was a daring 
and flagitious vsurpation, th.it had nit a shadow of leeal rishl, even in the House, much less in the Clerk, before 
the contested cases went before the Committee of Election,) New Jersey could not have been disfranchised, nor the 
sub-Treasury bill have been passed, liy Ihe mockery of an unconstitutional Congress ! 



12 

already quoted, says: "The original [letter,] of which this is an extract, is in the handwriting 
of, and si2;ned by, Martin Van Buren." — {See Memoir, page 45.) 

It may lie interesting to some youthful readers, less informed m political biography than others, 
to say an adilitional word of James A. Hamilton and Rufus King. Mr. Hamilton was the son of 
Alexander Hamilton, who has ever been habitually reviled by Mr. Ritchie as a " blue light, black 
cockade, feJeralisl." He was one of Mr. Van Buren's earliest political associates, and continued 
to be his fast friend for years, probably without abatement; for we lind him figuring conspicuously, 
in 1828, as the agent or representative of Mr. Van Buren, while acting in the dovible capacity 
of a delegate of Tammany Hall to escort General Jackson to a festival at i\ew Orleans, and to 
make a political demonstration against Mr. Calhoun on his return to New York through the 
South. Also, during the first month or two after General Jackson's inauguration in 1829, Mr. 
Hamilton was selected as Mr. Van Buren's locum fenens, as Secretary of State, till he could 
make preliminary preparations at Albany to resign the governorship he had held about three 
months, and repair to M-'ashington to assume his new station, at the right hand of Jackson, in 
person. But Mr. King was better known as a leading federalist, and a strenuous opposer of the 
admission of Missouri with her rights to slave property, independent of the legislative instructions 
participated in by Mr. Van Buren. It also delighteth Mr. Ritchie, and all the nomenclature of 
his classical correspondents, Romans by name, to vilify every Democratic Whig who has ever 
held social or political converse with Mr. King. Nevertheless, we see it was such men of the 
Federal party (upon whom Mr. Ritchie has lavished more billingsgate than ever fishwoman 
did on her rivals in the market) that Mr. Van Buren acted with, in opposition to the republican 
administration of Mr. Madison, until the defeat of Mr. Clinton and the re-election of Mr. Madi- 
soi; induced him to " change front" on the Vicar of Bray principle of keeping in favor with the 
"strongest side" — a principle so dexterously practised by Mr. Ritchie before him, under the 
temptation of the " loaves and tlie fishes," till at length he has cornered himself by his inconsid- 
erate vow to "sink or swim" with the "Magician," being too sanguine of his magical powers 
to du[)e the democtacy of numbers for desj)Otic ends. But for this vow, based probably on some 
private pledges he cannot violate to save his countri/, I must do Mr. Ritchie the justice to be- 
lieve that his disgusting vociferations in praise of the "Northern man with Southern feelings" 
would long since have been silenced, and substituted by " wrathy invective" and "criminating 
reproaches." 

IT. Mr. Van Buren an abolitionist in heart — advocated the extension of the right of suffrage j 
and citizenship, to free negroes in New York, whereby they are also eligible to office; — he 
also approves the admission of slaves to testify, in court, against white citizens. 

In the New York convention of 1821, to amend her constitution, "a proposition to restrict 
the right of voting to white citizens, was rejected by a vote of 63 to 59 — Mr. Van Buren voting 
in the majority." — {See Hnlland's Life of Van Buren, page 187.) The result of this vote, and 
other passages of the amended constitution, in which Mr. Van Buren concurred, is, not only 
that persons of color are put on a footing with white citizens of his Stale, in voting at elections, 
and entitling them to participate in instructing their Representatives in Congress, and petitioning 
that body for the abolition of slavery ; but they are rendered eligible to seats in the State Legis- 
lature and in Congiess, and to "appointment to office in that State — there being no disqualifica- 
tion of her voters in either respect, her voters being continually spoken of in the constitution as 
citizens, from among whom, without any express distinction or disqualification of color, such 
officers are eligible. 

On the agitation of the Missouii question in 1819'-2(1, Mr. Van Buren resorted to disingen- 
uous artifices to defeat the rights of that State to her slave property, without committing himself, 
till his plans might arrive at maturity — which the following facts, derived from Holland's book, 
page^ 144-45-4(1, plainly show, viz: A few weeks before the re-election of Rufus King to the 
United States Senate, (in Feburary, 1820,) effected mainly by the exertions of Mr. Van Buren, 
as already noticed, Mr. Van Buren authorized the use of his name " in the call of a public meet- 
ing of the citizens of Albany, to express their opinions on the extension of slavery beyond the 
Mississippi," [designed to be hostile to it of course.] A series of preparatory steps being passed 
through, a memorial to Congress was finally adopted, and Mr. Van Buren's name, as understood 
to be authorized, was affixed to it by Henry T. Jones, Esq , which Mr. Van Buren afterwards 
disclaimed, in a letter to Mr. Jones, as transcending his authority ; which, (with a little hair 
splitting,) he said, was a " permission to use my name as a committee to call a meeting of our 
citizens to express their opinion on the Missouri question ;" and adds, "you surely cannot sup- 
pose that the use of my name for that purpose, imposed on me an obligation to sign whatever 
memorial might he agreed upon by the meeting." The equivocation here, is fully apparent to 
all who know the accordance of the results, with the ohjects, of called meetings ! Yet, shortly 
after this, Mr. King being now elected, the Legislature immediately passed a resolutioii "in- 
structing their Senators and requesting their Representatives of the State in Congress to oppose 
the admission as a State in the Union, of any territory not comprised within the original bownd- 



13 

ary of the United States, without making the /)ro/(/i/7/on of slavery therein, an indispensable 
condition of ailmission" — "Mr. Van Buhkx votixo for the resolution' !" 

Mr. Van Buren has also voted in the Senate of the United States to prohibit the introduction 
of slaves into Florida. And iiis more recent "refusal to enter into diplomatic discussion of the 
proposition to admit Texas into the Union," (though a favorite object of his predecessor,) " was 
doubtless to embarrass the growing influence of the South, and ultimately to weaken the tenure 
of their constitutional rights." 

In his letter to the Hon. Sherrod Williams, Mr. Van Buren advance."? the opinion, that Con- 
gress has a right to abolisii slavery in the District of Columbia ; but in order tn make this sen- 
timent less offensive to the South, he fabricates a "doubt whether it will be ])olitic to do so." 

But other facts in abundance may be adduced to show the inclination of Mr. Van Buren, and 
his principal adherents, to the abolition faith, and expound the menial reservations of this great 
dissemliler on that subject, among which I may cite the following, viz: When Mr. Van Buren 
was Secretary of State, his principal messenger of the State Department was a fiike nf.gro, at 
a salary of $700 a year; a free negro was, and now continues to be, a messenger and the in- 
ternuncio to the Secretary of the Navy, Mr. Paulding, the friend and connexion of Mr. Ritchie, 
and a thorough abolitionist ; many free negrues are messengers in tiie Treasury Dci)artment, in 
the War Department, in the Post Office Department, and in several of the bureaus, at salaries 
that many respectable white citizens would be proud to accept lor the like services. About the 
time of ih(! Southampton insurrection in Virginia, a splendid negho ball was given at ihe 
President's Mansion, which General .lackson honored wilh a few moments of his presence, and 
was afterwards toasted by the company at their set supper. The excitement of the insurrection in 
Virginia was, in various other ways, felt in this District, as the records of the court will show, 
and one of its consequences was, an attempt *o kill a Mrs. Thornton, by one of her slaves ; who, 
from the atrocious character of the assault with an axe, at the dead of the night, while she was 
asleep, was condemned to be hung; but when the appointed time for his execution apj)roached, 
it was found that he had been reprieved for a short time by the President ; the reprieve was 
again repealed at short intervals, as if to exhaust public expectation, when at last, this midnight 
assassin was finally pardoned — and to evade public indignation, doubtle.«s, was clandestinely 
smuggled out of the city, and sent to Florida. Upon a more rrrent occasion, when Congress 
began to be flooded with petitions from a distance, for the abolition of slavery in this District, a 
communication being presented to the editor of the Globe, by the writer of this review, discussing 
Xhc inviulable rigid of property m slaves, as well as lands and chattels, except when "con- 
demned to public use, for an equivalent in money," the saiil editor, F. P. Blair, j)cremptorily 
refused to give it an insertion in his paper, (it was afterwards published in the Richmond En- 
quirer,) he, the said Blair, declaring that he totally dissented from the writer, and solemnly 
averred, as his belief, "that Congress has a right to cut the throats of every man ii'oiiian and 
child in the District .'" Let the reader take in connexion with this, the tact, that the leading 
doctrine of the locofocoes, is to tolerate no essential difference of opinion, and that .Mr. Blair is 
Mr. Van Buren's prime minister, or oracle of his "improved public press," and he will see that 
we have arrived at something like an expression of concurrent opinions on this subject, without 
citing, in confirmation of it, the appointments of thorough abolitionists to foreign missions 
and other high trusts. I shall not conclude this catalogue, however, without mentioning Mr. 
Van Buren's approval of the introduction of negro testimony against a white citizen, and that, 
too, under peculiarly aggravated circumstances, in the cnse of Lieutenant George Mason Hooe, 
a native of Virginia, in the United States naval service. In this case the testimony of two 
negroes, the slaves of the accuser of Lieutenant Hooe, was taken, and made of record against 
the accused, before a court-martial, which resulted in the dismissal of Hooe from the naval 
service, in defiance of his reinonstances against a procedure so revolting to the institutions of the 
South and the laws of Florida, where the trial took place ; Mr. Van Buren endorsing the same 
that he " saw nothing in those proceeilings to disapprove.'' Yet, this is Mr. Ritchie's boasted 
"Northern man wilh Southern feelings!" according to that Jesuitical overture, indeed, by which 
Mr. Van Buren falsely professed to betray the North, to court the South ; which was at once a 
double insult both to the South and to the Nonrn. 



III. Mr. Van Buren opposed the adoption of a bill of rights with the New York constitu- 
tion — he opposed the extension of the elective franchise — and he opposed the amenability of the 
higher officers of State to the ordtal of popular elections: the inconsistency of his sentiments 
on the veto power — his advocacy of long terms and re-elections to the chief Executive — the in- 
consistency of his doctrines and practice respecting ihe " spoils of office ,-" a system of tuhich 
lie ivas the unenvicd author. 

In the New York convention of 1821, to amend her constitution, Mr. Van Buren opposed th^ 
adoption of a Bill of Rights, in connexion with that instrument ; nevertheless such a bill would 
have been in accordance wilh the practice of nearly every other State in the Union ; as, indeed, 
did the Virginia convention strongly recommend the adoption of a Bill of Rights for the federal 



14 



constitution, and instrocted her deiec-atron in tUa f.,-^* c^^ 

not be sancUoned by publ cf ^f^^batir n on! v".'"^' °' ^ amendments proposed would 
people; [,h. people are always^Klt wlrd a ho n ''"" f" ^Jection of the whole by the 
bare, naked quesUon of ;mair.Sr;frrrout ,n th ^^ , ^^^'"VT'"'""' '^ ^^^^ ^^^^ ^"^ 

twenty members who would voL for f'^ '^L rtjT ' 1'^ "°' ^'^''"' '^"' "^''^ 

departure from the former/re.^o/i ' hficatio^won I. ^r" I" ^"'^ ^'^"' ^^^^ ^^^ g'^^t 
ment."-(6ee Holland i 18^185 S^ hazard the adoption of the whole amend- 

some of those vaunted dfLcrai'cprfnLles he ri^etri"'- 'Y' '' '' P^'P^'^^ contradictory to 
fess, one of which is that '' he oX^ii • n,e o iec nf P '"'"??'' '° ^•^"^'•^^^' ^'^ P'"''- 

benefit to the greatest number''-a dofma 'ever hi ^^°^'^''"'"^"t,'f ^^ ^"^^ure the greatest 
liable to involve injustice, oppression, anLan^^^^^ more plaus.ble than correct, as it is 

tracts, and other vested r ghts of the mfnoritv ff tV. '. tl °^ P^P.f '^ ^^' ^^1'^"^ °f con- 
property and be taught ^ theUt^r^'^l/.^^:;-,-- ^^^ ^It"^ 

party, as is further evinced by the efforts o? his partisaTo Zh T '^" ^'T- ^'''^'' "^ 

CAUSE THEIR DUTIES WKUE IMPORTAXT- ami it i,,-.^ »^ l,„ f J .u ? HI/\\trS OJ dtUtC, B L- 

to render their judgment su^.^^]^^^]^-:^^: ^::::^^-::^^ rncV'"'Thf 
professions and .he,rs to'wheedle the people not ^"""' '""^ "" '" '^"°" "'^^^ ^^ 1"« 

ve^;::" .^r G:::e;iS:r;^i;ar:r;i^'wi:^^^^ ^rrr'"-^ ^ ^^-^^-"^ *^^ 

that I not passed by two-thirds oJ thet n^Llt Sf ^ d i W of'itTlfat' ' "Th' ""^ "^' 
force and influence of legislative power would secure it I^Z^^ '2t<. noulnZZ 
have the /.«.e.^y, on ordinary occasions, to resist its acts, or check is proceedmgs '' anS 1 f 
referred o the English Constitution, where - the Executive is a branch of the LegSlture aid 

a Kin, of Great BrHain io any Mlllr^u:^^ ^ ^^^ "^^^^^;::;:: t 
excitcmen and irritation which even there would result from the rejection of a bi I passed by the 
Parhament, he has resorted to mean., which have degraded the Government and dishonored the 
nation, to prevent t he passag. of bills which he should feel it his duty to reject ^-^SeeHol 
land page 163.) Are we left to conjecture from this whether Mr. Van Bu ei 's more rec'nt 
declaration, in advance, that he would veto a certain bill, be an instance of /.,> "' degradat on of 
the Government and dishonor of the nation," by resorting to such means to prevelTSeTl^l 
of said bill, to relieve himself of the exciting consequences of its veto? or, is^his p emon ton Io 
Congress an evidence of the unceremonious levity with which he now vi;ws the^Iuper^ f^rce 
and influence (the sanctity) of legislative power? And yet, such an advocate as he fo the 
.-Executive veto, to check the <Megisktive power," State'and federal, didVfterwar^lf ir ' 
.peech m the feenate of the United States, manifest a holy horror at his o^n forced constrict on 
u( a veto povver o the bupremc Court over all the legislative acts of the several .Statesand «" 
Congress under the mere limited right to judge of their constitutionality ! It will be perceived 
by the iollow.ng extracts, that Mr. Van Buren's insidious attempts to preiudiceV^nJress and 
the several States against the Supreme Court was as artful in design as it Vas livoTous T" t'^ 
grounds of attack. On the 7th April, 1826, addressing the Senatef he sa dT 




^^ i^ailon d^comracjs." ^rJ^-f.^^^^^povi^I^U;. provision whu.h ca^e. sc^^rea^ ^^ ^ ^ ' ^^ei, 
swe?p '. '." " Bui of Ih.s high y «mbequenu i ji.diciary , no wmpla nls v^ ere nearo ^ i„u jf mo 

consuiuiiun was iheu unOersiood as a ncNs is, ,„,i«nhsPrvauon on .Is tendency, 



,d 



would say il should ^e oiher wise J g^lnipt, under ihis Provision, rem ihe sup ^r aniicipaudT 

al once see how su^all a poruon oi Us ex i^^, ^^^^ . ^^ accordance ^ ''^]>.^ '"™ vho^e acts (says he) the seal of 
the Supreme Courl. The F^^^'^-'y"' .'^^ ^f^r ihis was his drift J"''"' ^^^^JJ'Vrt 'the sovereign authorities of Ver- 
» There are f '^ ^'f-^-^nM u, t me been placed by the &".P^f "\° ^[1" ^^ Virginia, North Carolina, Missouri, 
condemnation has not, <^r«>" ^'?I^,^;i;;ew Jersey ['.] Pennsylvania, ^^f >f ";'', V^^^„ 1,'ority of this court." How- 

courts" u V ..n„f ^trirturcs of Mr. Van Burenl Is there no consola- 

Is there no appeal from the.e "'^.I'g"^', !^^^^".''7h^ If it be not fair to infer that the acqui- 
tion in the opinions of infinttely -ser udges tha h^^ ^^^^^^^^^^ is proof of flmr sanc- 

escence of those great Stales whose gr--^^^^^^^^ .ecomraend the reader to turn to the able 
Hon of the correct 7"^jf ^^^'/Jf ' ?"' fe^ Lrv delivered in the Virginia Convention, by which 

preside over the Supreme Court. Governor, and his eligibility to rc-elec- 

Lr a:r s^ :^-tSt » f ^^^^^ «^. - - — - --- ^^ 

tho'pKOP... He said, (see Holland, p. 166.) .^^ _,^,,,, po.er of the Gov- 

.Hehadnote.perienced.aieevi,sof^U« 

SKlor^=e\^h^V^ consent 

I^'entheVncurreJ^-Butliovvat.^^^^^^^^^ 

Governor's >^°"duct, not by the leei^^ . ^J^^^-^^ ,^,^ '^'I'TTuJ^Zre of public importance must occasion, 

]„Vgel?the effects of measures '. - " ^^.^^^^ ^^ ^^^ ^^^^^^^ ,^,^.^^^^^y^ ^^^ 

Truly, it took just three years, .horl b ^^r^a'"^' ^^i.^, «! law, to prostrate commerce 
the diversion of it from its customary us., under u^e r g^ ^ ___^^^ ^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^ ^^^^.^ ^^,^^,„. 

and the general prosperity "[ \h«.^^^""\7 ' ''l\l^ ihe Treasury and a standing army at his com- 
uance of Mr. Van ^^^^'^ ^ '^!^";^;"^"^'' J'JeompU^h its entire subjugation to his despotic rule, 
roand, to drench the country in ^ -^^^J' ^' ^'^//^^^IV'^^d l.e.onie an advocate of "strong v^ar meos- 
As long ago as 1813 when lie l^^'^ " "^^/j;^^^^^^ „f Governor Tompkins, he denounced the 
u,es,- Bpeakiu^ in a public address on ^^\^ ^^/'^ "^^ ^^^,, ,,„„en into their service, in very hand- 
dete;table practice of the Unt.sh ■" -pr- -f ^^^^ be acquiesced in by Government, with- 
some terms. He said it is 'a PJ^'^^^^^'^^j;;;"'' f^",,^ of obbi.if.nck and puotection he- 

out rescinding the great article o our. f2,/^Yc-'h^^ -mplain that their business... 

twcen the rulers and the ruled. .^"^^^^^ ^.J^,, ^„„a prav for relief, he answers "that 
ruined by the oppressive ""^^^'^^.'j^ffj'^^^'l^^^J" ••• ..'that the Governuient will take care ot it- 
tbe people expect loo much tr-m ll^^ Governmcn , i ^^.^^^^ ^^^^ ^,^^ ^^U ^„j 

self,^nd the people inu.t lake care "^ ^hein-l es bu be^n ^^^ ^^^^ __^ ^.^^ ^^^. ^^^ 

silv'er currency lor the office-holders ^"'^ ^f ^^^j^'jj^f^ ^J'S/, measures which the .oier sr.co.n 
once uniform currencv, ts one ''^''^c ''".''' j,^ ;„ November, t.u:v mkan xo lo.vgj.h to 
THOUGHTS of the pcoplc Will tcach him al Uie polls 
E>-nuuE! rr ,, J „ 101 ^ Mr Van Buren, then uwHuVig- his way to office, 



16 

er of circumstances t» destroy the virulence of party spirit." Now, when he has attained the 
highest command, true to the example of his illustrious predecessor, (whose conversion to the 
spoils system was his handiwork,) he has, like him, in order to retain power, become one of the 
most active partisans (as the author and patron of that detestable monarchical system) in fanning 
the flames of " party spirit." 

In the New York Convention, (see Holland p. 198,) Mr. Van Burcn said "that while he 
avowed the principle that the dominant party should always possy.ss and exehcisk the of- 
ficial patronage, yet he maintained due regard in its distribution should constantly be had 
for the rights of the minority." Now, if this be not an entirely incompatible sophistry, coined 
to please one party and conciliate the other, (for it is incomprehensible to me how he could give 
the exclusive official patronage to the dominant party, and yet, in its distribution, have constant 
regard to the rights of the minority, who were to have nothing, unless, in his view, justice to 
them consisted in not depriving them of their civil as well as political rights ;) yet I should say, 
it affords a loop hole through which to catch a glimpse of the "spoils doctrine" of the Albany 
Regency, when in its germ, however wonderfully ii has been changed in its rugged aspect, un- 
der the revision and emendations of its author, by transplanting it to Washington, and engraft- 
ing thorny salons upon it, from the time he began in the Senate to modify and give direction to 
the patronage of the Federal Government. We all know something of the enormous growth and 
corrupt exercise of that patronage since, for the benefit of the "dominant party," and in venge- 
ance against the. rights of the mijiority, which has nearlt shook the aioiiiL, heligiovs, 

AND POLITICAL institutions OF THE COUNTHT TO THEIR FOUNDATIONS. 



SECOND PERIOD. 



" His long study of the human heart, [speaking of Mr. V. B. when hb entered the Senate,] his great f>x- 
perienca in political matters, and his prp-eminem good i<ense, had given him a pnwer of interpreting t/ie popular 
will, and uniting, harmonizing, and DiRECTiNf; ihcfeetings of those wiDi ichom Ae acted, which few men ever 
ATTAIN TO." [Holland's Life and Political Opinions of Martin Van Buren,page 203. 



I. Mr. Van Buren, uniformly, for a series of years, has been an advocate for a tariff or im- 
posts for theprotection of manufactures — His subsequeiH repudiation of his first love, us an 
overture to the South — His supprrrt and denunciation of internal improvemnt, still more di- 
versified and inconsistent — His claim of initiative legislation, alone, brings the money poiver 
very much within his grasp. 

When our partisan biographer, Mr. Holland, comes, in his eleventh chapter, to treat of " Mr. 
Van Buren's cour.se in the Senate," he takes occasion to distinguish him with very high-sound- 
ing and laudatory compliments, to the great disparagement of the rest of the Senate. Without 
quoting those fulsome passages in detail, I will concede all that is meant to be assumed for Mr. 
Van Buren by his kind historian, viz : that he united, harmonized, and directed his political 
asssociates with whom he acted in the Senate, as alleged in the passage quoted above as an appro- 
priate heading for this period of his career, particularly as his biographer seems much enamored 
with it, desirous to make deep impression of its truth, from his frequent repetition of it in differ- 
ent parts of his book. It will, therefore, be perfectly fair to hold this boasted party manager re- 
sponsible for that ^'direction" which he gave to those with whom he "acted" in the Senate, 
in certain important doings of theirs, as well as what he enacted on his own hook, during that 
important period, which his biographer found it convenient to say nothing about, touching his 
overtures to the South ; though he professes that " nothing has been intentionally omitted, glossed 
over, or unfairly represented" — an expression which he also tikes pains to reiterate in sundry 
other places in his book, protesting that he "has inade strenuous endeavors not to conceal or 
raiurepresent" any material fact or opinion. After adding a further eulogy in disparaging the 
rest of the Senate, saying that, "to furnish a complete view of Mr. V. B.'s services in the Sen- 
ate of the United States, during the seven years he was a member, (from 1821 to 1829,) would 
be to transcribe a large portion of its proceedings," he goes on to give a meagre summary of 
his acts and doings on most of the prominent subjects of legislation of that period, with an omis- 
sion, nevertheless, of the principal features of some of them, which I will supply from other au- 
thority. He also distorts some of those transactions, and glosses them over, as we have seen he 
did, in many instances, in the preceding period, before he came to the Senate. I shall take the 
liberty of correcting these, as I have done those. 

The Federal Government and the State Governments, taken together, constitute the elements 
of a whole and pfr/Vd sovereignty. The States, individually, are imperfect sovereignties, so 
far as the powers delegated to the Federal Government abate or curtail their former complete sov- 
ereignty. The Federal Government is also an imperfect sovereignty, so far as the powers not 



17 

delegated to it, but reserved to the Slates respectively, are wanlint; to make that sovereignty com- 
plete. The soverrignty of the Federal Government is complete in nil things that appertain to 
foreign relations, and to the internal commerce between the States. There are many minor sub- 
jects of legislation on internal polire, not connected in any manner with forei;^n relations, or with 
the relations between Slate.s, between States and citizens of States, and between citizens of dif- 
ferent States, which come within the sphere vf joint, interferinsr, or participating sovereignties 
of the Federal and the State Governments. And I doubt whether there he any subject of legis- 
lation in which a State has exclusive sovereignty, in regard to the United States aiithority, inas- 
much as the whole range of State legislation is subject to the supervision of the Federal Govern- 
ment, through the Supreme Court, so far as any infraction of any of the delegated powers of the 
federal constitution may be involved in such legislation. These ge; eral hints are thrown out 
here, to liring the contemplative mind to some focal points involved in the sequel. And, for the 
same purpose, it may be well to bear in mind that the federal constitution consists of three prin- 
cipal AnncLKs, besides several others that are miscellaneous. The first relates to the Legisla- 
ture ; the seanid relates to the Executive; and the third in the Judiciary — each comprising mat- 
ters more or less enhancing or restricting the powers and duties of the others. In the eighth sec- 
tion of the first aiiticlf., the specific powers delegated to the legislature are enumerated in 
eighteen clauses, of which I copy the three first and the eighteenth, viz: 

" The Coai;ress sljall tiavc powpr— 

" 1. To lay and collect laxos, diiUos, imposts, [vulgarly callpd tariff] and excises, to pay the debts and provide for 
the common defence and eeneral welfare of the United States; bni all duties, nnposis, aitd excises shall be uniform 
throughout the United Stales. 

" 2. To bi)rrow money on ihe credil of the United States. 

"3. To rogulate commerce with foreisn nations, and anions the several Statesi, and with the Indian tribes." 

"18. To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foreeuing powers, 
and all other povicrs vested by iliis consliluliou in ihe Guvernnienl of the United States, or in any 5epannient or 
officer thereof." 

Under this eighteenth clause, the reader perceives that Congress has the power, as cflTertually 
granted, tiuuigh not by name, tu make whatever laws it shall deem necessary and proper to ex- 
ecute any other jiower, as that power itself was conferred ; and that any measure, for that pur- 
pose, which one Congress may deem necessary and prop'r to-day, may at another time, under 
change of circumstances, bt deemed unnecessary or inexpedient to the end desired. 

From the earliest moments of legislation under the constitution to the present day. Congress 
has found it "necessary and proper," by the coneurretit votes of all parties, in order to "regu- 
late commerce" and "to provide for the common defence and general welfare," not only to lay 
imposts (or taritf) fur revenue, but to protect the manufiu tures that might minister to the " com- 
mon defence and general prosperity ;" and not only to protect such manufactures, but to construct 
forts, arsenals, military ways, and whatever else they might deem necessary to the "common 
defence," &c.; also such harbors, canals, roads, &c., as Congress may deem necessary and proper 
for the general commerce, or commerce between the States, &c., paying due deference, as a 
matter of expediency and decorum, to the wishes of the States most immediately concerned ; so 
that the difficulty consists not so much in the right to act as the discretion in acting. Whether 
politicians may, to-day, admit these plain truths, and to-morrow deny them, and still claim 
credit for consistency, is another matter. For a masterly exposition of this whole subject in all 
its bearings, I would refer the reader to the refutation of the " views" of the Richmond Enquirer, 
by the Editors of Ihe National Intelligencer, in a series of essays through the months of June, 
July, and August. 

On the .subject of the tauiff, as long ago as the 30th January, 1817, resolutions were adopt- 
ed in the New York Legislature, m.iinly by the influence of Mr. Van Buren, and " the domi- 
nant party" to which he was attached, "instructing their Senators and requesting their Repre- 
sentatives in Congress, to use tlieir influence to obtain efficient protection for the infant manu- 
factures of the United States," &c. And by these resolutions Mr. Yan Buren and his friends 
laid the foundation of that very tariff, of which his present Southern supporters have ever since 
complained. — (See New York Senate Journal, pages h2, 78, as quoted hy the New York 
Times,- but entirely ontiUcd by Holland.) 

He voted in the Senate of the United States for the tariff of 1824, without hesitation, scruple, 
or instructions. (This is admitted, but glossed over by Holland, page 27.5.) 

On the 25th February, 1837, he voted in the Senate of the United States against reducing the 
tax on salt ; which, in the opinion of the salt champion of Missouri, is the most objectionable 
item of a high tariff. — (See Senate Journal 1827; but omitted by Holland.) 

At the same session, however, Mr. Van Buren began to quail on the general tariff, as we 
learn from Holland, (page 27^,) who says: " At a public meeting held in Albany on the 10th 
July, 1827, Mr. Van Buren delivered a speech of considerable length and great ingenuity," in 
which he examined "the tariff bill, which passed the House of Representatives in 1827, but was 
laid on the table in the Senate — he concurring of course. In the course of his speech (says he) 
Mr. Van Buren intimates his serious fears, that the friends of protective duties were urging 
their measurs with too much eagerness. He also cautions manvfactcueus against uniting their 
fortunes with any political adventurer ,-" a home bit, this, that will tell at the rebound of the 
2 



18 

sober BfiCOTXV Tnovinns of the people in November next. This was his "sheep speech," so 
famous for favoring contradictory opinions. 

In the Spring of the same year, 1827, when Mr. Van Buren, accompanied by Mr. Cambrel- 
eng, was making a tour through the South, on an affected pilgrimage to Mr. Crawford, but in 
fact with sundry political speculations in view, such as ascertaining, by authority, from Mr. 
Crawford, the enemy of Mr. Calhoun, something which might at a future time he used to sup- 
plant Mr. Calhoun in the uffections of General Jackson, and at the same time to make such 
overtures to the South, as might serve his own turn, in case GeneralJackson should not be taken 
up by the South to supersede Mr. Adaips, hk did, in replies to invitations to public entertain- 
ments, resort to similar misgivings with those above referred to ; and, particularly, in his answer 
to an invitation by the citizens of Raleigh, he denounced those acts of federal legislation, upon 
what he called constructive rights, meaning the tariff and internal improvementSy which had 
been frequently and earnestly advocated by both himself and his travelling companion Mr. Cam- 
breleng. Seizing the opportunity of railing at the administration for what he had so frequently 
aided in doing, as national measures, he said : 

"All dispassionate observers will admit that the measures (of the administration) to which you allude, justify the 
alarm you express. The spirit of encroachment has assumed a new and far more seductive aspect, and can only be 
insisted by the exercise of uncommon virtue." 

That this offering to the South, was propitious, is apparent from the Columbian Telescope, 
of South Carolina, proclaiming at the time, that " Mr. Van Buren is not unlikely to succeed 
GeneralJackson, if he keeps steadily iohxs present plan I^'' (See the Political Mirror, pages 
41, 42; and chapter " hoiv to diipo^e of a rival," page 124.) These important passages in 
Mr Van Buren's magical life, are not even alluded to by his biographer, Holland. 

But Mr. Van Buren rallied again, in the next twelve months, and "voted for the tariff 
OF 1828," which provoked the most serious commotion that ever threatened the peace and in- 
tegrity of the Union, in the South, headed by Mr. Calhoun and his nullifying friends. This is 
admitted by Holland (page 298) to be true, notwithstanding the speech of 1827, above quoted. 

Mr. Van Buren was also the coadjutor and adviser of the author of the proclamation anil the 
force bill, the natural offsprings of the above tariff. He was Vice President, resident at Wash- 
ington, at the time those exciting measures took place ; Mr. Livingston, the author of them, 
and a native of New York, having been appointed Secretary of State by' the recommendation of 
Mr. Van Buren, at the dissolution of the cabinet in 1831, those measures must have been sub- 
mitted to his advisement, and received his entire approbation, upon every principle of reciprocal 
praises and obligations between him and General Jackson — though the objectionable parts of the 
proclamation were afterwards explained away by General Jackson, at the instance of his political 
high priest anil confessor at Richmond, doubtless, also, with the approbation of Mr. Van Buren, 
in order to conciliate Mr. Ritchie and the South. 

With regard to ixternal improvements, (the handmaid of the protective tariff, so far as 
the one encourages the home producijon of the muniments of war, &c., and the other affords the 
facilities of making them efficient, transporting them from place to place, &c., not otherwise 
sufficiently provided,) we have already seen that Mr. Van Buren was for a long time opposed 
to Clinton's plan of Slate improvements ; we shall now see how he vacillated on this subject in 
regard to the policy and pinvers of the Federal Government. 

In the Senate of the United States, in may 1822, he voted for the preservation and repairs of 
the Cumberland road, and for establishing United States' toll-gates on that road, in the States 
through which it passes ; with other such latitudinous provisions, that caused Mr. Monroe to 
veto the bill. (This is indirectly acknowledged by Holland, page 271.) 

In 1823, Mr. Van Buren voted, in the Senate, for provisions similar to the above, in 
relation to the preservation, repairs, and continuance of the Cumberlaml road. This; and 
the preceding frets are indirectly acknowledged, and more than half suppressed by Holland. 
The only notice he takes' of these votes is, in an extract from a speech of Mr. Van Buren 
on Foote's resolution, several years thereafter, in which he adverts to his votes on the Cum- 
berland road, and says, " it is by no means certain that, in this respect, he himself has been 
altogether W\i\\o\i\. fault." Certain circumstances "had induced him, luithout full examination, 
to vote for a provision authorizing the collection of toll on this road. 1'he affair (says he) of 
the Cumberland road, in respect to its reference to the constitutional powers of this Government, 
is matter entirely sui rexeris !" A case, siii generis, in regard to its constitutionality ! ! I 
will venture to opine, without any hazard of mistake, that there is not another man, 6. F. Butler 
excepted, the compeer of Mr. Van Buren, into whose mind the conception ever could have en- 
tered to fabricate such an unique prevarication and false pretence, to excuse an act which, had 
it not been his own, he would have pronounced, according to his then existing political cue, to 
be unconstitutional. To start v. doctrine that any case tvhatever can come up in the whole 
range of legislation, that can entirely evade the question of constitutional power over it, on ac- 
count of any peculiarity that may be set up for it, is so absurd and unstatesmanly, that the pre- 
sumption with which it is advanced can only be accounted for in this instance by the long prac- 
tice, and unparalleled success of Mr. Van Buren in the arts of deception and counterfeiting the 



19 

siinilitiulu o( trutli. -My reason for makiiii; llie aliove exception in behalf of Mr. Butler i)«, lie- 
cauAu that gentleniiin has deiuonstrutcil his tad in the same sort of literary anomaly while he was 
Attorney General — though 1 presume he had acquired "some (more) acquaint;ince with Latin" 
than Mr. Van Huren had. In the fall of i 56, when the Secretaryship of War was about to 
be vacated by Mr. Secretary Cass accepting the embassy to France, Mr. IJiitlt.T ilesired the situ- 
ation and salary without vacating that of Attorney (ieneral, notwithstanding the incompatibil- 
ity of the relation he would then stand in, as legal adviser (in quality of Attorney General) to , 
himself, (in quality of Secretary of War,) — for tiiis would be an advantage to liim in all his 
olHciul perplexities as Secretary of War, as he would be sure, upon con.su/lalion, to have lh» 
opinion of the law officer on his side; and, if the question should be raised as to his right to 
hold two offices, or to draw two salaries, uniler the constitution and the law, his opinion, in the 
capacity of .Attorney General, might be decisive with the Secretary ol the Treasury — particular- 
ly if he could do away a palpable solecism by legal logic, or the hocus pocus of his legal reputation, 
and malic it appear that his second office was no office, but a nondescript sui generis case of ser- 
vice, and that he was entitled to the exact equivalent of the salary, for extra services, (the stand- 
ing sui generis for all impostures of the kind.) Accordingly, he did arrange the thing exactly 
in the exiiuisite V^an Burcn style of letjal quibble, and succeeded in befooling General Jackson 
and the Secretary of the Treasury, secundum arteni. He styled himself "Secretary of War, 
£wfi«/mm," and so signed his name to all official papers while he was acting in this double 
capacity, about a year, cheating the country, and giving a shock to the common sense of every 
man who cast his eyc« on so novel a title, unknowti to the laws or the constitution. 

*' On the 22d January, 1824, Mr. Van Buren called the attention of the Senate to the alirm- 
ing assumption of power by the General Government, in regard to ' internal improvements.' " — 
(•See Holland, page 267.) '«0n the I9th of December, 1825, he again brought forward the 
same subject, and oflered two resolutions, one of which declared ' that Congrct-s does not pos- 
sess the power to make roads and canals within the respective States.' " {i<ee ditto.) " On the 
21st Aprd (same year) he opposed the api>roprialion for the Louisville canal." {Ditto, page 
269.) And, on the 15th May following, he ojiposed the proposition to subscribe, on the part 
of the United States, to the Dismal Swamp Canal, connecting the navigable waters of Virginia 
and North Carolina. On the last but one of these occasions, Mr. Van Buren said : 

" The aid t>f this Government can only be atTordoil lo ihose cbjpcts cf improvement, in three ways : by making 
u mad or canal and a.<!sumiag jurisdiction ; by making a mad or canal wiihiut assuming jurisdiciion, leaving it to 
the Suiips ; or by making an appropriation without domg either. In his opinion, the General Government had no 
right to do either." 

The reader has now before him two remarkable instances of Mr. Van Buren's oscillations from 
the extrtme.sl constitutional constructiveties.s, without the posssiliility of his having entertained a 
sincere belief in the "necessity" or propriety of collecting tolls' by the (United States on the 
('umberland road, to the (xtreinest respect iveness to the letter of the constitution, equally im- 
probable of belief 10 justify him, in denying the power of the General Government to aijl a State 
improvement by approjiriation or loan. Mr. Van Buren, who commenced the study of law at 
fourteen, after a lapse of about thirty years' devotion to nothing else but law and politics, was 
yet so ignorant of the constitution in 1822, as to believe that the United Stales had constitutional 
power to C0S8THUCT a uoad, (sui generis, be it remembered) assume ji;kisi)Ictiox, and col- 
lect TOLLS, within the States ! ! But as soon as he finds it politic to make overtures to the 
South, and take lectures from profcssi)r Ritchie on his beau ideal of a " Northern man with 
Southern feelings," he is ready to take his diploma upon such restrictive construction (being no 
construction at all) aa would render nearly the whole code of our laws unconstitutional, because 
they are not in accordance with its lktteii ! ! an absurdity, which needs only to be stated, to 
be fully ajjpreciated, thus, viz : that if every law must conform to the letter of the constitution, 
that is, have a ///era/ provision for it in the instrument, it would require that the constitution 
should anticipate and embrace, in advance, the whole legal code; and that whatever law be not 
therein literally embraced, shall be considered unconstitutional, which is absurd. It results, 
then, from this argumentum ad absurdum, that the "necessarily" implied powers are infin- 
itely more numerous than those powers expressly enumerated ; as each of these must carry with 
it a train of correlative powers that may be deemed by Congress "necessary and proper" from 
lime to time, to carry it into execution. 

So that, while I must agree that, according to the example of most of our illustrious statesmen 
before he began lo strut his brief hour on the stage, his advocacy of protective in)posts and internal 
improvements would have constituted some claim for Mr. Van Buren's taking rank in that galaxy of 
brilliant names, I must be permitted, nevertheless, to say, that all his seeming merit therein, has 
proved to be nothing but the frothy declamation of a political speculator, from the time he trafficked 
away his consistency, by time serving overtures to Mr. Ritchie for " Southern influence, to pro- 
mote his ambition." Mr. Ritchie well knows that Mr. Jefferson was not only an advocate of a 
tirifiFor imposts for the protection and encouragement of " our infant manufactures, suited to our 
circumstances," but of internal improvements, by the Federal Government applying any surplus 
of revenue from imposts, to the construction of roads, canals, &c., as expressed in many of his 



20 

messages to Congress, down to his very last annvial. Such, also, does he know were the senti- 
ments of Mr. Madison, Mr. Monroe, and even of General Jackson, [with the exception of some 
unintelligible distinctions and inconsistences in the latter part of his administration, which he 
must have derived from Mr. Van Buren, through Uie promptings of his preceptor at Richmond.] 
Yet Mr. Ritchie has pertinaciously striven, against public opinion and the estaWislied policy of 
the nation from its birth, to establish a Tom Ritchik school or politics dejiounciiig all impli- 
ed poivers, for the adi->pti(m of Virginia and the whole South, which has had a greater tendency to 
undermine the Union, than Mr. Calhoun's mad career and all his nullifying friends put together, 
inasmuch as his is but an infection from the 'J'om Ritchie maxia. But it would be rational to 
suppose that Mr. Van Buren's former zeal for a " {)rotective tariff" and "internal improve- 
ments" would have been sutlicient to have excluded him from the Tojn Ritchie school, if Mr. 
Ritchie were the man whose political consistency, propriety, directness and good failh, on other 
occasions, would entitle him to be counted upon. Not so, however ; for it has been a favorite arti- 
fice of Mr. Ritchie to lay low, and await the signs of the popular current, and in the mean time, to 
coax eminent men to modify, explain away, and annul their former opinions, so as to enable 
him to claim them to be of his way of thinking on the favorite doctrine of his school, for which 
he barters his pretended influence over Virginia politics, which is sure to seem considerable when 
the ebb makes in his direction. The recent case in which Mr. Ritchie has seduced Mr. Poinsett 
and Mr. Van Buren seriously to implicate their own veracity before the American people on the 
subject of the standing army of 200,000 men attempted by them to be imposed upon the coun- 
try under the disguise of a militia regulation, is yet perhaps -4he most remarkable instance of this 
sort of political prostitution in the Tom Ritchie calendar. 

Let no one suppose that I have charged this billing and cooing, this tratiicking between Mr. 
Ritchie and Mr. Van Buren, unadvisedly. Without going into the details of the political inter- 
course that commenced between them, on Mr. V. B.'s visit to the South in 1827, which has 
j^obably been unremitting ever since, embracing sundry other personal visits of Mr. V. B. to 
Mr. Ritchie during the Virginia convention in 1830, and since he has been President, with the 
long visit of Mr. Ritchie at Washington during his inauguration, I will content myself by put- 
ting together a few facts that have already been made public, independent of what I am confident 
could be proved, by a committee of investigation authorized to send for persons and papers, • 
showing the corrupt and clandestine influences used to swerve the President from the settled 
policy of the country, and particularly that the declaration of Mr. V. B.'s biographer is as true in 
this, as in other cases, viz: that "he unites, harmonizes, and directs, all with whom he acts," &.c. 

Holland, speaking on the subject of internal improvements, /). 27i, says: " The course of 
General Jackson's administration has done much to throw light upon this suliject, especially his 
famous veto message upon the Maysville road bill. Mr. Van Buren luas then a member of his 
cabinet, and, to use his own language, ' gave to the measure of which that document was an 
exposition, his active, zealous, and anxious suppoiit." He then quotes irom an electioneer- 
ing letter of Mr. Van Buren, addressed to a committee at Shocco Springs, N. C. in October 
1832, while he was candidate for the Vice Presidency, and afterwards remarks upon them thus : 
" These extracts, it will be noticed, go farther than the veto message upon the Majsville road 
bill, and assume the ground afteiiavauds adopted by the President, that even Fon puhposes 
which might be t)ekmi:d of a national chahacteu, no appropriations ought to be made 
without a previous amendment of the constitution / .' ' I ask, is it not now palpable, from 
this gradual progress of Mr. Van 13uren from the extreme doctrine of "collecting tolls on the 
Cumberland road," to the opposite extreme of demanding' "an amendment of the constitution 
to authorize an appropriation for avowed national objects," (the identical doctrine of the Tom 
Ritchie school, ) and the consequent, progressive, corresponding changes in General Jackson's 
views of that subject, and of his "reasonable tariff," that there existed a corrupt coalition for 
political effect against the known will of the country, by which the 'J'om Ritchie doctrine was 
to find favor and support in Mr. Van Buren, and then, through his "clandestine influence over 
General Jackson," was to become the court doctrine of his administration ? 

But lest tliese should be deemed insufficient to satisfy those whose affections, or rather delu- 
sions, are so strong that they do not wish to be undeceived, I will quote an extract from the 
■Richmond Enquirer of 25th June, 1830, which if it does not show under whose influence the 
President vetoed the Maysville road bill, it affords further proof at least, of that pervasive influ- 
ence by which .Mr. Van Buren " unites, harmonizes, and directs, all with whom he acts" — as 
the letter was written by one of his most zealous political friends, and perhaps one of the most 
effective in procuring the success of his recent elevations to the highest offices of the country. 
The letter was {from Washington,) dated 18th June, 1830 — 

" The opposition, when the President put his veto upon \\\e IMaysville rojul bill, calc.\ilated with OTPal certainly 
that Pennsylvania (in sportsman's phrase) would bolt. Indeed, some of our own friends gave evideril syn)ptoms of 
alarm, and" Lhoughl all was lust. However, the thing has gone forth, in as hideous a dress, too, as the opposition 
press could characterize it, withal ; and, to their astonishment, that State still stands firm, and has not yet shot 
madly from her sphere. She still holds the front rank, and is No. 1 . We have been most agreeably disappointed. 
The democracy of that democratic State, have taken a correct view of the subject of internal improvements, and 
will firmly sustain the President in the cuurae he haslaken. I have lately received several letters from gentlemen 
living in that Slate which evince a degree of unanimity, not to have lieen expected by the most sanguine of our 



Hi 

frieud*," kc. &c. '• I have no fears of Pennsylvania. I never c.in beUevc, whatever may be her opinions as 
respecls Ihe consiiliuionalily of ihe que8liuii,lhat she will consent to Ije taxed to make roails and canals in other 
Staiec, after havint'spriil not l-ss than twenty millions of doUais in making her own roads and canals. Situated 
as she is, it would lie infinitely preferable, I should think, (if improvements are to be madi- at the expense of the 
Federal Government) to have tin; surplus revenue divided among the States, as proposed I y ilie Prfsident accord- 
ng 1.1 iheir respecti\e reprfsent.iliotis in Congress, &c. DE vVIT CLINTON." 

" The fiiresoins reflf^rtions are so jusi, in ilie^abstnict, that they are nsapplicable to New York as to Pennsylvania, 
and the fact that those two ^r^at Slates have zone so e.vtensively into internal improvements at their own expense, 
is a presumptive evidence uiat tliey did not I'ormcrly consider it coiieiitutional even to volt, lor appropriations from 
the General Government for those obji'Cls, cVc They are then doubly bound to act with Virginia and the South, 
both on the oljli^iali'ins of consistency and iiucrest.'' 

[By the way, I cannot trivc that corrupt coalition any of the credit they woulil assume to 
thcmselvca, in the matter o»' giving a home direction to Stufe improvements, as it is obvious that 
the rapidity of the demand for improvement would not permit tiic Slate authorities 1o "wait the 
slow motion of federal aid, and that the liostility, of the party in power, to improvement, on 
any terms, is fully deinonstiated by their attempt to disgrace the credit of the States abroad, in 
the very necessary matter of negoiiatins funds for tiiose objects, by raising a hubbub in the Sen- 
ate about assuming State debts, witiiout a liint or request to do so.] 

Were it necessary, I could easily show that these narrow-minded and unstntesnianly doctrines 
of Mr. Van Buren, derivei! from the Tom Kitchic school, are not in accordance with the settled 
policy and practice of the country. Independent of the s])lendid instances of internal improve- 
ment, and improvement in our infant manufactures, aflording commercial facilities and profits to 
productive labor through our vastextet^jt of country, etVectcd by apprnpriatiims and fostering /?ro- 
tection of Congress, the simple fact, that there are standing committees of Congress, " on Internal 
Improvements,'" and " on Roads and Canals," and " on Manufactures," is alone stiflicicnt to show 
that these are among the [)owers or means deemed " necessary and proper" to carry specific powers 
into e.xecution. But these implied powers are not only the results of the aggregate countela of 
the nation : even Virginia herself, never was, in her collective sense, as a State, nor in the 
individual opinions of the great majority of her wisest statesmen, opposed to the exercise of these 
powers, as necessarily implied by the specific; powers. The petitions that have been firesenled 
to Congress from time to time, from all quarters of the State, praying the aid of (congress in 
her in'ernal improvements, might alone be considered conclusive on this subject. I will select a 
few of those petitions, by their titles, [)resrnted from the remotest parts of the State, during the 
earlier part of (Jene-al Jackson's administration, before he adopted Mr. Van Burcn's fostered 
doctrine of the 'i'om Ritchie school, but which Virginia has not yet adopted, and I believe never 
will. 

'• Petition of the President and Directors of the Northern Tiinipiko Company in the State of VirL'inia, for the con- 
struction of a road from Leesburg in Virginia to Cimiberland in Maryland, prayinp for a sul^s ription of their stock 
bv the Governinrnt of the United States ; which petition was referr'eil to the Committee on Roads and Canals." — 
House Journal for the session 1828- '29. 

" Petition of inhabitants of Harper's Ferry and its vicinity, in the State of Virginia, praying Consrress to grant to 
a Company incorporated for the purjKise of erecting a bridge over the river Shenandoah, srrounds sufficient for the 
abutments of said bridse ; as also for a grant of moriiey to aid in the erection of said bridge."— House Journal, session 
lb29-'30. 

•• Petition of inhabitants of the town of Wheeline, in the State of Virginia, praying that efficient measures mav l* 
promptly adopted for the improvement of the navigation of the river Ohio, fiom, its --ources, to Lcuisville, in Ken- 
tucky; "which petition was referred to the tlommitlee on Internal bnrrovemenis."— Srssimi lS.iO-'31. 

" Petition of sundry citizens of Richinond, (in Virginia,) praying that an adequate appropriation may be made to 
remove, the obstructions to navigation in Jamer River, between the port of Kiclnnonu and Burwell's bay ; which 
was referred to the Committee oii Conmierc""— House Journal, 183I-'3-2. 

It is also a remarkable fact that the last of the above-named petitions came from the city of 
Mr. Ritchie's adoption, signed by many of Mr. Ritchie's warmest political and personal fiiends, 
was the result of several public meetings held on the subject, and was forwarded to Congress, 
without any protest fiom Mr. Ritchie against it. Away, then, with the senseless pretences, thai 
a protective taritl" and internal improvements are incompatible with the Virginia creed, and are 
not within the province of Congress, whenever that body deems them necessary and proper, as 
the means of executing powers specifically enumerated. 

II. Ulr. Van Barents inconsiatency respecting the constitutionality of a Bank of the United 
Stales: His coniliincd safety bank system i7i New York, for political purposes : Failure of 
his attempt to seduce or intimidate the United States Bank to the embraces of Executive dicta- 
tion — as a substitute for udiich he introduces his New York system, by combining State bunks, 
as depositories of the Treasury, under Executive control: Explosion of the system occasiona, 
a resort to a sub-Treasury bank, in order to accomplish the original design of usurping, con- 
centrating, and monopolizing the money power. 

It is generally thought that, by constitutional right, Congress wields the monkt powf.h ai> a 
balance to the Executive power over the sword. But, when it is considered that Mr. Van Bu- 
ren claims the "initiative" as well as the "final" legislation — the initiative by virtue of his au- 
thority to recommend measures of legislation, the final by virtue of his power to veto all bills — 
will not the reader perceive that the purse or money power is brought very much within his 
grasp ; and that it is of vast importance to wrest these gigantic initiative and final powers from a 
man whose principles set so loosely upon him, that they flit about and change front with every ^ 



political breeze that Mows ! Under any circumstances, these nre dangerous powers in the hands 
of a bad man ; but, being in such hands, with a corrupt majority of the legislature composed of 
his own partisans, supplicating his patronage and executive favor, is at once equivalent to an ab- 
solute surrender not only of the money power, but the whole power of legislation. 

This brings me prematurely to a remark, upon the great " sj)oils system," of which Mr. Van 
Buren is the author, as it originated in his own Slate, and perfccter, as it is now practised in 
the Federal Government. But, from the definition I would give of that system, it will be per- 
ceived that this sort of corrupt Executive influence over legislation constitutes a part of that sys- 
tem, and therefore a brief dehnition of it will not be entirely out of place here, though more 
properly coming in connexion with an exposition of the abuses of Executive jiatronage ())roperly 
so called) introduced into the General Government by Mr. Van Buren's clandestine influence 
over Gen. Jackson. 

The most lucid conception that can be formed of tliis "spoils system" may be that which di- 
vides it into three great branches, as follows : 

The first I would denominate the direct "spoils of office," or of offices actually existing — this 
branch being assumed to be under the direct control of the Executive as his right of patronagk. 

The second I would term the indirect " spoils of office," or of offices not actually existing, but 
in prospective, to be brought ultimately into the sphere of the direct spoils office, by the Presi- 
dent's initiative power of legislation operating ujjon a venal legislature. 

The third I would designate as the indirect " sjjoils of business" in general, consisting of un- 
equal benefits to portions of the community at the cost of other portions, to be brought about 
by the President's iniiiative power of legislation operating upon a venal legislature. 

That legislation, so materially in the hands of the Executive, as I have shown the federal le- 
gislation may be, under the circumstances stated, should, in all instances that afi'ect large ap- 
propriations and establishment of new offices, in which the President either indicates the section 
of country on which such appro{)riations may be exfjended, or has the appointment of officers that 
may be required, and the disposal of all other matters connected with the initiation and the ex- 
ecution of such laws, CONSTITUTE a part of the great "spoils system" must be manifest notwith- 
standing the novelty of the definition. Also, that other legislation, likewise materially in the 
hands of the President, as above supposed, which affects unequally the business operations of 
different portions of the comiuunity, some for better some tor worse, accordjug to their party as- 
pect, SHOULD, in like manner, constitute a branch of the great "spoils system" is equally evi- 
dent. These two branches of that system, however, cannot be reduced to such certain calcula- 
tion of vicious and venal motive's, as that of the direct "spoils of office," actually existing — to 
which, by a great mistake, the spoils system has generally been supposed to be confined. The 
" spoils system," then, embraces the whole money power, direct or indirect, so far as the Pres- 
ident may, by his own act, directly or indirectly bring the control of i7 "within his own 

GRASP. 

After a protective tariff and internal improvements, the next most striking example of the im- 
plied powEHs of Congress, is, that of incorporating a Bank of the United States, for the purpose 
of carrying into execution one or more of the specified powers, such as " to facilitate pe- 
cuniary loans" upon emergency, "to aid in the fiscal agency of the Government," and "in es- 
tablishing or maintaining a uniform currency," among other, incidental, benefits that would ne- 
cessarily accrue to agriculture, commerce, manufactures, and other matters of business, promotive 
of the common good, or " the general welfare" of a sovereign people.* 

It is in i\\is, field of implied powers that nearly the whole of the legislative labors are necessa- 
rily exercised in all constitutional Governments, as I have already endeavored to show. And it 
is in this field that systems may he attempted by conflicting parties, party compromises and co- 
alitions, or even by the concurrent patriotic zeal of all parties, which, if pushed to extremes, may 
threaten, and imminently jeopard the common good, in violation of that salutary restriction, 
requiring that the exercise of such powers shall be in accordance with "the common de- 
fence and THE GESEiiAL welfare" — [a phrase, by the way, which has been so vilified, for 
party effect, as to render it a prejudice against a measure, to say that it is called for or rendered 
"necessary and proper," by " the general icelfare," in "executing a specified power."] Such 
abuses were apprehended to be the tendency of those branches of the great American system, 
just j)assed under review in the foregoing section — whether from just cause or from the excite- 
ment of strong party prejudices; and, therefore, a jealous people, yielding to the dictates of pru- 



♦ Since writing the above, from recollection, not having the act of incorporation before ine, I am enabled to sub 
join, by way of note, from an able editorial article in the National Intelligencer, of the 27th August current, the 
nrpaoible to theiict of incorporation of the Bank of the United States, to which Washington alHxed his approval as 
Prpsidont of the United StatPa on the 25th February, 1791 : 

"Whereas it is conceived that the establishment of a Bank of the United States upon a foundation sufficiently 
extensive to answer the purposes intended thereby, and, at the same time, upon the principles which afford ade- 
quate security for an upright and prudent administration thereof, will be very conducive to the successful conduct- 
ing of the national finances ; will tend to give facility to llie obtaining of loans for the use of the Government in 
sudden emergencies; and will be productive of considerable advantages to trade and industry in general : There- 
fore," Sec. 



dential motives, arrested or abated their progres.~, by counter indications to their Representa- 
tives ; and" the enterprise of the .States has well substituted a part of it by tlieir own exertions, in 
the exercise of their co-ordinate power, to meet their own calls for internal improvements with- 
in their respective limits. 

'J'he fixedness of internal improvements, to the local objects, rendered it practicable for the 
co-ordinate power of the iSlate, and the Federal Government, in this i)arlicular, (as in all other 
case* of co-ordinate powers,) to be operative without interference or collision ; and, therefore, 
the right of internal improvement was not exclusively granted, or prohibited, to the Federal Gov- 
ernment, but was left to be exercised (co-ordinately) among the implied jiowers, " necessary and 
proper," in the estimation o( Congress, to execute other powers* specifically granted, "tor the 
common defence and general welfare." But the mercurial character of commercial intercourse 
renders it impossible for any State to protect her own manufactures by countervailing commercial 
regulations, that would not be liable to atlecl, injuriously, the manufacturing and other interests 
of other States ; and, therefore, the specific power "to regulate commerce," was given up by 
the States, and exclusively conferred on the Federal Government, with \\\e general power over 
all measures that migiu be deemedby Congress to be necessarily and properly incident thereto. 

To incorporate a bank of the United States, I have said, was one of the intplicd p(nvers found 
to be necessary and proper to carry into execution one or more of the f^peclfied powers. Of the va- 
lidity and soundness of that decision, made in the earliest days of the constitution, by men, too, 
who had taken the greatest part in its formation and adoption, we ha\e the corroborating opin- 
ions of many of the tnost eminent statesmen of the demncralic republican purli/ of Virginia, as 
well as liie rest of the Union, at the time it was first ndojited ; and the same decision, with the 
judicial coiifinnalion of the Supreme Court, has ever since been steadily maintained, with an in- 
creased majority of the republican [larty,* up to the [ircsent time, embracing the very period of the 
late rESTiiucTiox of the second bank tint had been established and based on that decision. 
And this same bank would have been recharlered by a large majority of all parties in both Houses 
of (Congress, in liie high party times of Jackson's administration, but for his vkto, which re- 
quired two-thirds of both Houses to pass the bill in defiance of his personal hostility. Yet, neither 
the VKTO, nor the outrage of removing the public deposites from the bank to insure its iiKSTHt'c- 
TioN, and llierehy prevent a renewal of the efVorts of Congress to recharter the same bank, were 
perjjetrated on account of any constitutional objections to a national bank of a particular organi- 
laiion (a Tiensury bank) to suit the views of the Executive. For, besides the evidences of an 
opinion favorable to the constitutionality of a national bank occurring in nearly every message of 
General Jackson during his first term, there, is, in the very draft of his instructions to the agent 
authorized in 1833 to make arrangements for the removal of the deposites to State banks, jirepar- 
atory to the destruction of the United States Bank by drawing off the vital principle infused into 
it by Congress at its creation, a recoi^niiion of the constitutionality of a bank. Of the various 
modes of expression by which General Jackson declared his opinion in favor of the constitution- 
ality of a national bank, I take tlie following remarkable one from his message of December 7, 
1830, with which he counecl.s an acknowledgment, also, of the benelits of such an institution 
to the country : 

" 111 Ills spirit of improvement anil loinprunii.ic which (Jisliniiiiishes our country and its inslitiilions, it becomes \i» 
to inquire whetlitr it be not possible to secure the advanlagps alToriled by tlie present liank, through the agency of 
a b<uik of the United Stales, so modified in its principles and structure as to obviate constitutional and other ob- 
jections." 

The passage in Gen. Jackson's instructions to the agent, above adverted to, runs thus : 

" It is the opinion of the President, that hereafter as hrreiofore, bank agency will be found convenient, in man- 
aging the fiscal operations of the (;<'V(>niioi'nt, and ais he cannot, con.sistently with his avowed sentiments, sanc- 
tion any national inslitutinn organized u|)iii ihe principles of the existinc Bank of the United States, he deems il 
proper to ascertain whether all lht» services imw rendered by il, may not be performed by the banks incorporaied 
by ihe several Slates, on terms equally or more lavorable to Government.'' 

This was substituted, by order of the President, for a paragraph in the original draft of instruc- 
tions made out by the Secretary of the Treasury, in which General Jackson was sufiposed to be 
adverse to the constitutionality of a bank, and the substitute was made solely to correct thatmis- 
api)rehension, as we are informed by the authentic narrative of Mr. Duane. — (Sep P^g^ 9' of 
said " Narrative.") 

The reader is now prepared to appreciate the bearing of these facts, in connexion with others 

♦ It might be acceitoble to many were I lo mention here the names and arguments of the eminent men chron- 
icled in our political and legislative history, as being original and acquiescinc advorales of this power; but for 
want of space and time must foreu'o those deuiils. It would be seen that such a list would not only conmience with 
the name and clear reasonine of Washington, and embrace every other Virginia Fresidem, JetTerson, Madison, and 
Monroe, bul that it would includo every President we have had, excepting only the existing incumljent, Mr. Van 
Buren. Nay, it would lie seen to comprise many others of the strongest and most gified talents of the democratic- 
republican* party (now so mocli disgraced by the desecration of its name to impose iac<ibjnical, locofoco doctrines 
on confidinir democrats,) besides some of the present prominent locofocoes themselves: of the former, we would 
see the names of Wm. H. Crawford, Alexander J. Dallas, and General Smith, of Maryland ; among the latter, the 
names of John C. Calhoun, Felix Grundy, and John Forsyth, who are now in close alliance wilh the most radical 
locofocoes against the institutions of our country. 



24 

yet lo be mentioned, upon Mr. Van Bureii's potiition of " uncompromising hostility to a bank of 
the United States," and upon his relation of "Magnus Apollo in General Jackson's Counsels." 

Can it be for a moment supposed that General Jackson would, without Mr. Van Buren's se- 
cret approval, have persisted in favoring the constifnliunality of a national bank, (of a certain or- 
ganization, indeed,) notwithstanding Mr. Van Buren's declared influence over him, as implied 
in those resistless magical powers imputed to him by his biographer, of "uniting, harmonizing, 
and directing all wilh whom he acted," and as actually exercised by him in effecting olher im- 
portant changes in Jackson's opinions, particularly those of his " reasonable protective tarifi," 
and " internal improvement in avowed national objects," as set forth by Mr. Van Buren himself, 
in regard to the latier, in his Shecco Spring electioneering letter quoted by Holland, (page 272) 
in which, speaking of the President's Maysville veto message of 1830, he says, "I throughout 
[the discussion of the principles of that message] gave to the measure, of which that document 
was an exposition, my active, zealous, and anxious suppoutV What is the true and ob- 
vious import of this "active, zealous, and anxious support," of a velo to a measure of internal 
improvement, while discussing that measure of an administration, of which Mr. Van Buren 
"was the spirit and the creator," at a time, too, when "no formal meetings ot the Cabinet 
Council were holden, (See Mirror, page 247,) which cabinet meetings General Jackson had 
dispensed with during his Jirst cabinet, in order that he might, without jars and conflictions 
of opinion, give his whole ear to Mr. Van Buren and his confederates, Kendall & Co. 1 It 
surely means a secret, effective, countervailing influence over General Jackson's preconceived 
individual opinions on the subject; particularly, too, as ihere were no cabinet consultations held, 
and General Jackson did "afterwards adopt" the extreme extent of Mr. Van Buren's new born 
scruples against the constitutionality of " approprialions, even for purposes avowedly oi z. nation- 
al character." — {See Holland, page 274.) 

This important question, then, naturally arises — how came it, that Mr. Van Buren, as the 
spirit and creator of General Jackson's administration, as his chief privy counsellor and clandes- 
tine adviser, failed, nevertheless, to indoctrinate General Jackson against the constitutionalitv of 
a national bank ] and that we hear nothing of such objection, in the history of the day, until it 
suited Mr. Van Buren, in his eleclioneering overtures to the South, to declare "uncompromis- 
ing hostility. to a bank of the United States 1" A few facts, to my conception, will render this 
mystery as clear as day : it will be palpable that Mr. Van Buren was not at that time of a mind 
to declare his uncompromising hostility to a hank, but would gladly have co-operated with Gen. 
Jackson in procuring the establishment of one, with such organization as would have rendered 
it a fit tool for the abuses of Executive authority .ind influence, and thereby have brought the 
MONEY powEH materially under Executive control. Grant to Mr. Van Buren (with the exceptions 
I shall show to it) the truth of Holland's statement (page 303) that " he has been a firm oppo- 
nent, throughout his whole public life, of the extension of the banking system in New York, and 
of the Bank of the United States;" grant that, with Mr. Wright, Amos Kendall, and the rest of 
his radical agrarian factio.i, "he considers wealth an order of nobility {ditto, p. 300) not guard- 
ed against by the bravery or wisdom of our patriotic forefathers," and that he considers it " the 
grand engine of self-exaltation and popular oppression," used as he has used it ; grant that "of 
all inventions which have been put in operation in this country," he considers "the most excep- 
tionable are incorporated companies, and that the worst of all incorporated companies are banks," 
as he ivoitld use them ! and that he (Mr. Van Buren) is a real hard-money man, opposed to the 
paper system, in favor of a national currency oi gold, and in favor of an adequate silver currency 
fgr common use {ditto, p. 308:) grant him, in common with his associates, the profession of all 
these opinions as part and parcel of the same systeni of denunciation they have been practising 
towards all the valuable corporations which have been such powerful and eflicient agents in the 
internal improvement and prosperity of every State in the Union, yet, by the very exceptions he 
has made in his practice, to those professions, I should be able to show the insincerity of the one, 
or the wilful and deliberate baseness of the other — that these professions were to answer sinister 
purposes, and that they were abandoned or laid on the shelf whenever he could make a contrary 
or temporizing course minister to his ambition. Or why did he, as Governor of New York, pat- 
ronize and recommend the combination of her banks, if not as a political engine, under the title 
of the safety fund system? Why did he, through his long and faithful political yokefellows, 
Levi Woodbury and Isaac Hill, endeavor to convert the United States Bank into a political in- 
strument at the control of the federal Executive ? Why did he, on failing to accomplish that 
object, conspire with other venal and irresponsible associates of General Jackson to obtain by ob- 
lique approaches and intimations to Congress, the charter of a Government bank organized upon 
dilTerent principles from the then existing bank ; and, failing in that, resolve its destruction, and 
resort to the association of State banks as depositories of the public moneys, thereby bringing their 
combined influence under the control of the Executive — if all these manoeuvres were not for the 
wicked and selfish purpose of administering to his own ambition, by gaining the command of the 
money power, regardless of the yet untold mischiefs he has brought upon his country! Of the 
most important facts that serve to resolve these queries, I proceed to give a brief account from 
the best authorities, for the benefit of the public, who have necessarily been unable to see and 



compare thetn \\\ juxtapoaition, so eBsonlial to enable tlirm to a|)preciatc tliis branch of the great 
" system of spoils" by which the country has been beggared, and the Govirnment reduced to 
bankruptcy. I shall first quote from Holland, (pages 320, 321, 322) what he tells us Mr. Van 
Buren said of the New York banks, in his message to the Legislature the Ist January, 1829, 
"after alluding, in the happiest manner, to the distingui^slied abilities of his jtredecessor," De 
Witt Clinton : 

" H(3 (Gov. Van Burc'ii)8ays the nitial important biisin'-s.i of ihe session, wasllie queetinii of renewinp the charters 
of the several banks in thb State: thirty-one churlers wuultl expire in the Cuursp of four years, wlin a capital of 
fifteen millions of dnlUis, and debts amnuniing lo thirty millions. He alludes to the dirterence between thPir 
situation al thai lime, and the laying the foundation of ihe'banklniij system anew ; and says, in viow of the extent 
ol these insliluti .ns and iheir close cnne-xim with the affansol tliu comiininily, ihal 'to dispense with banks, 
altogether, is an idea which seeins lo have no advocates.' ' He says, thai experience is against 1 ankinL' owned 
wh. lly by the State, and that to make stockholders liable, in their private capacity, throws the responsibility into 
ihe hands of irresiMinsible persons.' ' He finally concludes that the present solvent banks cannot be so suddenly 
closed, without a violent di.suirbanceof the interests of the public ; and alludes lo ' a sensible and apparently well 
considered plan' which hail been subniiiled Id him, and which ))roposed ' lo make all the banks resjionsible for 
any loss the public inay sustain, by the failure of any one or more of them.' He then presents a biiel epitome of 
the ''safely fund system,' and concludes this pan of his message with ihe remark, thai 'the interest which attaches 
itself to the representative cliaracier, can never be greater ihiu when the fullilmeni of the trust committed lo the 
representative, may brim:; him in conflici with the claims of the great moneyed inien sts of ihe country."' 

*' On the aeih January lc*-.I'J, .Mr. Van Buren, in a brief message, introduced [fur the second time] to the favorable 
notice of iht- Legislature, the celebrated 'safely fund system.' This plan orieinaled with ihe honorable Joshua 
Fornian, and wa. by him laid before Mr. Van Buren. Il was somewhat modified by ihe suggestion of the latter 
and finally adopted by the Legislature." ' 

This is nearly all (hat Holland says on this insidious scheme, except a few extracts from the 
magniloquent praises of it by Thomas Hart Benton, (always entitled to do more harm than gooci 
to any cause) addressed to General Davis of Mississippi, in pursuance of the cluhdcaiuie system 
of ehdioneering organized by the cabal at Washington. 'I'he following is a more; full and 
iiagacious representation and commentary of the sa.me plot in e/iibri/o, from the unknown author 
of the Pulitical Mirror, p. 233 : 

" There is a power incident lo banking institutions, which is susceptible of great abuse. They may coiUml thri; 
debtors and their customers, and m ly be used for political eft'eci. Bui in the ordinary isolated and indei)endenl 
stale of these insliiutions, llieir number and adverse interests almost annihilate this power. Their stock and their 
business are distributed ihrouL'houl the community; and as no one, singly, can affeci public opinion, aiienipts for 
thai purpose have been, consequenily, never made. Bui a momenl's consideration will show a case wholly differ- 
ent, where many of these iiistiuitions in a Stale, or in ihe Union, combine, and are directed hy the will of an in- 
dividual or uf a party. The restraint upon the dangerous power of each bank is removed ; thedpiicndani upon 
bank favor cannot seek relief from oppn-ssion by shifting his account; he has but one mean of obtaining, perhaps, 
indispensiible pecuniary aid: he must conciliate the bank directors, and iheir favor is lo be purchased only by nis 
vole and influence in political contests. The possible abuse of this jKiwer, by individual banks, has, by many sound 
political economists, been objected against til- ir creation ; but their greamse overpowered the objection from pos- 
sible aliiise, until their very number bpiame protection. Bui, when banks combine, the power lo pervert their 
faculties is increased; and llie restraint wholly taken away. 

"Amid all the excitements of party, fir foriy years, no one had conceived the design of combining the banks, lo 
Control the iiojiular voice. No Ijold and designing politician had ventured upon this expedient, until the subtle 
genius of Martin Van Buren seized it in the project of the safely bank system of New York. 

'• This system, we undersland, is not the ofispriug ef Mr. Van Buren's scheming and prolific brain. It was be- 
goili ;i, probably, in the purlieus of Wall street, in the commerce of money chancers, whi looked lo it only, so far 
as it regarded themselves, as a pecuniary speculation, but who were fully aware that the political power it might 
give Would be its best recommendation to Governor Van Buren. When first submitted to him, il was reteiveil 
coldly. His attention, as he lay upon his couch whilst the details were read, was divided between the reader and 
a newspa[)pr : bin when ihe SLigjiestiim was made, that the loinbined banks would furnish a (xiwer which might 
not only check ihe operations of the Bank of the United Stales, btit might so control that institution as lo render it 
a serviceable engine throughout the Union, iiislanlly, all the energies of the cariless lisiner were roused. No ear 
of lovesick girl ever drank wiili more intense delight the long-desired, but unexpected, love tale. What a )iros- 
peel w;is here opened! The banks of the Siate of New York, weak and ;-.scless for parly effect in their individual 
existence, were hooped togeilur, and became like the fasces, the bundle of banded rods borne by the lictors before 
Ihe Koman Consuls, the representative of irresistible (xiwer; whilst ihe bank of the United Stales [would] like a 
serpent, wrap all opijosina interests in its folds and crush them beneruh his feet ! 

"The project was instantly adopted, clierished, nmlured. and is now, in New York, in full tide of successful ex- 
periment. The Stale, overwiielmed by a moneyed arisiociarv [so much reviled by Mr. Van Buren except when he 
can use them lu his own purposes] is bound lo the car of I\Ir. Van Buren's ambition. But llie beaiifick vision which 
pnrapiured his sight, could noi be immediately and wholly realized. The Bank of the Uiiiled States could not be 
seduced or Coerced to minister lo his unhallowed ends. The attempt to influence it was not omitted, (however,') 
and the war, upon that insliiiition which has ensued, so disastrous to the coun'ry, but so beneficent to the ' dominaui 
parly,' js to be ascribed lo IMr. Van Buren ! !" 

♦ * ♦ (Page 235.) "The safely fund act, passed in 1829, rei|ui res that all banks thereafter incorporated [lh« 
whole of the bank charters were then about to exjiire] should pay annually, for six years, one half per cent, equal 
to a contribution of three percent upon their respective capitals— to remain the properly of such banks respec- 
tively, but lo bo vested under the direction of the Comptroller of the State, in pniduciive stocks, subject lo ihe 
payment of the debts and losses accruinii to the community from insolvent banks— thereby making the combined 
banks mutual assurers for each other, uniting them in such manner that the whole may be moved by the same 
impulse, and operate iiresistibly upon all oilier banks in the Slate [and when all should come lo be recharled il 
would embrace the whole.] Three ci>mmissioiiers preside over this [many-headed] monster; one appoimeil by 
the State, the others by the banks. These are visi'ers of all the banks of the associ.iiion ; on the su-jgrstion of 
one of whom, the Chancellor of ihe State is required, by iniunction, lo stop llie proceedings of a bank, and, unless 
cause be shown to the contrary, to subject il to the pain's of insolvency. This power, unconnicted wiih ivolitics, 
may have little danger, may be, perha()S, useful ; but in the hands of politicians, and in the condition of iioel 
Country ba'iks, especially in New Vork, may,and does, make the banks connected with the system, the subjects 
of party influence. 

♦ ♦ ♦ (I'age iiG.) " Siwn after the election of General Jackson, a meeting was held in Washinclon of the prin- 
cipal chiefs of the party, ui consider of the means lo perpetuate their authority, of vshich p-issession ol the bank 
was anions the mosl prominent. The first manifcsiation of iheir purpose was in June, (of ihe same year,) 1829, by 
an auempt (supported by Mr. Woodbury, then Senator, and since Secretary of the Navy, and now S9cretary of the 
Treasury, and by Mr. Isaac Hill, late editor of a violent Jackson journal of New Hampshire, then unconfinned Sec- 
ond Comptroller of the Treasury, and now a Senator of the Untied Stales,) [since a pension agent, and now Re- 



ceiver General of ihe Treasury ai Boston,] to coerce the bank to repiove the president of the branch bank at Ports 
mouth, upon party grounds. This attemjit was countenanced, if not fullv participated in, liy Mr. Ingham, Sc-cre 
lary of the Treasury, who undertook to give the liank 'the views of the Administration' in relation to'the appoint 
menl. 

■' Upon these extra irdinary instances, the bank deemed it necessary to extinguish, if possible, at once, the hopf 
of conveninip' it into a party agent. The president of the institution, therefore, distinctly announced to the Secre 
tary of the Treasury that ' ilie bank rightly apprehended his views ; and that it became his duly to slate, in a man 
ner so clear a» to leave no possibilhy of misconception, that the boards uf directors of the bank and of its resjiectivi 
branches acknowledged nut the slightest responsibility to llie Secretary of the Treasury, loucliing the p.ditical con 
duct of their olficeis : that being a subject on which they never consult, and never wish to know the views of anj 
Administration ; that, for the bank, which has specific duties to perform, and which belongs to the country and no 
to party, there was but one course ol honor and safety ; that, whenever its duties came iu conflict wiih the spirit o 
parly, it would not coinpromise with it, but openly and fearlessly resist it ; that in tl>is ils interests concurred will 
its duly, as it would be found, at last, tliat the best mode of satisfying all parlies was to disregard all.' 

'• Noiwiitistanduig this decisive rebuke, there lingered in ihe l"josom of Mr. Van Buren a hope that the ban! 
might yet be constrained to submission, or he dreaded to make iipon it a resolute and unequivocal attack before ihi 
pany had been thoroughly prepared to sustain it. Whilst, therefore, the Presidential message of 182'.l struck a dread 
ful note of preparation lor danger, it reserved a locus panitentia, a place for turning ; and such continued the pol 
icy of the parly fur tln'ee years ! 

•' In that message the President was made to observe : ' The charter of the Bank of the United Slates expires ii 
1836, and ils stocitholders will most probaldy apply for a renewal of their privileges. In order to avoid the evili 
resulting from precipitancy, in a mi^asure iuvolvmg such iinporlant principles and such deep pecuniary interests 
I fpel that 1 cannot, in justice to the parties interested, too soon present it to the deliberate consideration of the Le 
gislature and the people. Both the constilutlonality and the expediency of the law creating this bank, are wel 
questioned by a large portion of our fellow-cilizens,' &c. * * * In this there is no committal on the constitu 
tional power, &c. The paragraph assumes the character of precaution for the interests of the parties, while it threat 
ens the bank with possible danger. 

" The message of ItJiiO is more explicit of the views of the Administration. ' Nothing has occurred,' says thePres 
idem, ' to lessen in any degree the danger which many of our citizens apprehended from that insiilution, as at presen 
organized. In the spirit of improvement and compromise which distinguishes our country and our institutions, i 
becgmes us to intiuire whether it be nut possitile to secure tile advantages afforded by the present bank, through thi 
agency of a bank of the United Stales, so modified in ils principles and structure as to obviate const ilutional am 
other objections.' Still not a doubt is expressed of the constitutional power of Congress. But the existing bank i 
distinctly apprized of the design of the Administration to prostrate ii, and to establish another, modified on piinci 
pies which would obviate the obJRClions uf the President to it. Though the non-committal hand of Martin Vaj 
Buren be visible heie, there is a clear admission of the right of the Gov'ernment of the United Stales to incorporat 
a bank, with an expression of a disposition to make one suitable to the views of those now directing the affairs c 
the nation. 

" The subject (of the bank) is veiy briefly treated in the next annual message of December, 1831, [Mr. Van Bv 
ren being then absent on his short embassy to England, but left the Presiaent more than ever imbued with liis wi.she 
and returned the next spring, after the rejection of his nomination, to connect his future operations on the money 
jwwer with his canvass fur the Vice Presidency.] The message says : 'Entertaining the opinions heretofure e> 
pressed in relation to the Bank of the United Stales, as at present organized, I felt it my duty, in my former nies 
sages, frankly to disclose them.' To disclose what ? That the consiilutionalily and expediency of the law creatiu; 
the bank was doubted (not by the Administration, but) by a large portion of our fellow-cilizens ; that many of ou 
citizens apprehended danger from that insiitution as at present organized. There is evidently [in all this tena 
ciousness ol the idea of a inodifled organization] a door kept open fur retreat, [from constitutional scruples ;] and 
had the bank proven itself sufficiently docile and obedient, a very inconsiderable change in the provisions o( it 
charter uiighl have made it, tlie presont bank, constitutional and expedient; and the ''many citizens,' who wer 
conjured u[j to ' doubt' or ' appreliend,' would have been annihilated with the same magic wand that had callei 
them into being. 

'• The Adiiiinistraliun foresaw, and events soon made it evident to all, that the nation was not prepared for the ei 
tinction ol the bank, when the desigii against it was first conceived. The first attack was repelled at every poini 
The committees of both Houses of Congress reported in favor of the existing bank The Comniiltee of Ways am 
Means distinctly put and ably maintamed ihe following propositions: 1. That CongreFS had the constitutiona 
power to incurpurate a hank such as that of the United Stales 2. That it is expedient to establish such an iiisliu 
lion. 3. That it is inexpedient to establish a iVational Bank, founded on the credit and revenues of tlie Goverr 
ment. 

" Thus rebuked and instructed, a decent respect for the Legislature required that the President should have lei 
the subject to them and the ]jeople. [whose immediate representatives they were,] until he should be railed to ac 
upon it officially. But this course did noi quadrate with the views of the party— of Sir. Van Buren. The nation, i 
sulTered to discuss it solely as a question -f public pol icy, would, it was feared, recognise and pursue its truein'eresi! 
and, in due season, racharter the bank, and mar forever the design of the Administraiion to engross and wield tt 
money-power of the country. An appeal was, therefore, [presumptuously, and in contempt of the rights of ih' 
'.vhule people through their direct legal representatives,] made from the councils of the nation to the Jackson parly 
[or rather V^ai) Buren faction,] who were termed the )jeople ! !" 

Failing in this scheme of alternative parts, either to convert the existing bank into an Exccu 
tive machine, or to reorganize ils charter for the same end, Mr. Van Buren's third alternative 
was to transfer the "safety biink .system of New York" to the General Government, so far a: 
the association of State banks as public depositories of the Treasury would give their comlunet 
impulses into the hands of the Executive. In order to show that Mr. Van Buren's "associate 
banks" was the model on which the President's new plan was formed, and that Mr. Van Bu 
ren, who had returned from England, had located himself at Washington, and was the fellow 
traveller, the mentor, of the President during his Eastern tour, and in close counsel with hin 
when lie wrote to the Secretary of the Treasury from Boston, June 26, 1833, I shall make a fev 
quotations from that letter and from the President's instructions to the agent authorized to mak( 
arrangements with State banks as depositories and fiscal agents of the Government. Th( 
fallacies of reasoning and fact e.^tliibited by those extracts, contrasted with the known results, ivil 
strike the mind of the reader with as great force as the singular correspondence between the Var 
Buren State and the Van Buren federal .vssociation of banks, as a lever to control the mon 

EY POWER. 

"The State institutions are, in his opinion, [Jackson's letter,] competent to perform all the functions which tin 
United States Bank now performs, or which may be required by the Govermnent. At the same time that they can 
not 80 effectually concentrate tlie money powei-, they cannot be so easily or effectually used for individual, politi 
cal, or party purposes, as a Bank ol the United States, under any form, or of any character. It is, therefore, the de 
sire of the Presiaent that you should immediately turn your attention to the making of such arrangements as wil 



27 

naliln ihe Government to carry on all of its fiscal operations through the agency of the Si.ite banks— (Jackson's lei- 
er ui Duane ; see Narrative, p. 16.) 

"But the insecurity of the putjlic deposites is not tlip only reason which will justify their removal from the Bank 
if the United Slates. The President thinks that the use of the means and jxnver which they give, to corrupt the 
Tess and public men, to cuntnil fwpular elections, to procure a rechartf r, ci^ntrary to the decision of the people, [a 
raiuiious assertion,] and ti cain posspf>sion of tlie Government, which it was created to serve, are sul etanlial reu- 
ions requirinc tlieir removal." " But the strongest and controlling reason, in the mind of the Pnsidem, is that 
*hich has Ije^n liefore referred to, and which consists in the necessity of organizing a new scheme for the collec- 
ion,* dpiHi.site, and distritiutinn of the public revenue, based on ilic Slate baiiks, and making a fair cipcriment of 
ts prariicability before the expiration of the charter of the exi.siincr bank ; llial the country may have a lair oppor- 
unity to determine whether any bank of the Uniteil Stale.s be nei essary or not.''— (Ditto, p. 26. ) 

" Time has shown \'- at the curtailment of the ucccimmodnlloiis and the circulation of the bank produces nosensi- 
le efftrt on llie business of the countrj-."' [Indeed !] "The establishment of new Slate banks, und an extension 
if the old, fill up the space from which the United Slates Bank withdraws, and the community at larpe is scarcely 
len.ible of the change." [Truly!] " Such will be the progress of events, until the bank hiw wound up its cori- 
erns and ceased to exist, when its absence will neillur be fi'lt nor regretted by the people." [1 commend this lo 
he special wonder and admiration of the reader.]— (Ditto, p. 27.) 

" It is the President's opiniim that the |xiwer over the Slate banks which the Bank of the United Stales now pos- 
esses, is derived almost wholly from its receipts of ihe public revenue. It is chiefly through the money ihus receiv- 
id that ii cibtains, direcUy or indirectly, the paper of ihe State banks and raises balances against them. If its re- 
leipis of the public revenue shall rease, its means of raising those balances will cease. If the State banks become 
he receptacles of the public revenue ihey will insianlly be enabled lo raise like balances against the Bank of the 
j'nited Stales and its branchc s. Tliat bank will not only be deprived of jwwer, but ihai power will be lran.«iferred 
where '] into ihe hands of the Slate banks." 

[So says the jesuiiical prompter of this letter, while, in his mental reservations, he knew that the power would 
)e transferred to the hands of the txecutive, who was now about ?■ ducing ihem to come within his grasp, as may 
le seen by the f illowing extracts from the iiroposed regulations of iheni by the President;] 

" Instructions," (lo the agent,) "(E.) 1. '1 hat one bank be selected in Baltimore, one in Philadelphia, two in New 
fork, and one in Biston, with a right on the pan of the Government lo add one in Savannah, one in Charleston, S. 
'.,one in thn Stale of Alabama, one in New Orleans, and one inNnrlolk, upon their accediiin to tliei'Tmsjin'iKiaed ; 
,11 which shall receive the deposiies in those places respectively, and be each responsible to the Goverinnent f t 
he whole public deposites, wherever made. 

" (F.) 2. That those lianks shall have the right, by a convention of their presidents or otherwise, lo select all the 
lanks at other points througljoui the United Stales, in which the public money shall be deposited, with an absolute 
lecative by the Secreiaiy of the Treasury, 

(G.)"3. That the Secretary of the Treasury shall have the power lo discontinue the de^msites in any bank or 
lanks or break up the whole arrangement, whenever he may think propi^r; he giving, in such case, the longest 
lolicp of his intention to do so which the public interest may warrant. 

(H) "4. That the primary and secondary banks shall make returns of iheir entire condition to ihe Secretary of 
he Treasury monthly, or ol'icner if he shall require it ; and rcporl to ihe Treasurer weeklv the slate of his depositee 
i'ith them respectively; and that they shall also subject themselves to a critical examination of iheir books and 
ransaciions, by the Secretary <if the Treasurv, or an authorized agent, whenever the Secretary may require it " — 
Ditto, p. 85.) 

HaviiitT perpelrntt'd the deed, their extreme solicitude that the subsiituia for the inimolateJ 
iscu! agent of the Governinenl shuiiid succeed, betrayed the quacks of the udininislration into 
uch extreme stimuhition of the State banks to do every thing lliat could be done by the United 
states Bank, that they presently overdid the work with such wild excess as to explode the whole 
ysteni. 'J'he Secretary of the Treasury, immediately upon executing Gen. .Tackson's order to 
nake the deposites in State banks, addressed the banks selected to this eflect : 

" The deposites of the public money will enable you to afford increased facilities lo commerce, and to extend 
■our accommodations to individuals; and, as the duties which are payable to Government arise from the business 
nd enterprise of iiinchaius engaged in foreign trade, ii is but reasonable that they should be preferreii in the ad- 
liiional accommodations which the public deposiirs will enable your institution lo cive, whenever it can be dons 
without injustice to the claims of other classes of the community."— (Extract from the Secretary's letter to the Gi- 
urd Hduk of PhiladelpliM, dated '20lh September, \iTi.) 

In 1820, there were only 308 banks in the United Slates. In 1830, during a space of ten 
?ears, there had been only twenty-two banks adileil lo the above number, making 330. In 1837, 
here were 788 banks, being an increase of 458 l>aiiks, in little more than two-thirds of the time 
n which there had only been an increase "f twenty-two bankn. liut immediately after the re- 
noval ot the depositee there were more than 2(J0 new banks chartered in one year. Such were 
he truils of the slatcamunt^hip .' of a set of men whose immaculate " director'' had professed to 
ic theoretically opposed to banks altogether, but had recommended the recharter of the New 
If'ork banks, (as he suit/,) merely because they were so connected with the business of the citi- 
;ens generally, that they could not be suddenly di^penscd with. Since then, we have seen him 
md his partisans co operating in (he mulliplication of banks almost indefinitely, and as suddenly, 
ipon the explosion of their wicked designs, turn about to demolish their own progeny, together 
with the whole banking system, which he had avowed could not be dispensed with altogether ! 
6 such a man to be longer entrusted with the management und " direction" of national ali'airsi, 
vherein the worst of tyrannies cannot be more di-.ajtrous, than the instability he has introduced 
n our laws and mtr civil institutions ? 

Here, then, we have seen that Mr. Van Uurrn recommended the recharter of all the banks of 
New York in 18S9, because, " to dispense with banks altocether, is an idea which seems to have 
■10 advocate." Per contra, he is now for crushing them all at once throughout the Union ; and 
lis party slaves in Congress have commenced llie work at the last session, by crushing tho.-e of 
he District of Columbia, preparatory lo the general catastrophe, which his proposition of a bank- 



* This is a deliberate purpose to violate ihe first of the explicit powers delegated lo Congress by Ihe cunstilulion, 
tiz : that " Coni^ress shall have power lo lay and collect taxes," fcc, by provision of law of course, over which the 
["resident lias no control, but lo execute its provisions. 



rupt law was intended to effect in another way. Query, liid not Mr. Van Buren's lenity towardi 
the banks of New York arise from his scheme then proposed, of " banding thein together" as i 
political engine ? 

We have also seen that Mr. Van Biiren, shortly after putting the comhination, " safety ban! 
system," in operation, made oyertures and threats to the Bank of the United States, through his 
parly friends whom he "directs" to become an executive tool ; and pending three years' an.xiou: 
hope of effecting his object of grasping the money power in this way, suspended all expressioi 
of his constitutional objections to a bank of the United Stales ; and on his failure to seduce o 
intimidate the bank, even yet, without denouncing the constitutionality of a hank, he lakei 
measures to destroy that institution, and to transfer to the Federal Government the system o 
combined State banks, similar to the combined system he had introduced in New York ; and ac 
tually so far succeeded in his unrighteous purpose, by usurpation and violence to the constitu- 
tion, until the system itself demonstrated the wickedness of the design, and the fatuity of its exe- 
cution, by an universal explosion — partly efTected by the contagious mania, brought about by thi 
inspirations of Executive madness, of multiplying State banks and speculations of all sorts, thi 
natural fruitions of Mr. Van Duren's inordinate over-reaching ambition. 

Not disheartened, however, at so signal a reproof for his want of patriotism and statesmanli 
foresight, he straightway resorts to a substitute, in a scheme of a sub-Treasury or Treasury bank 
which his whole party had stigmatized with reproachful epithets, while they had better hopes o 
the other schemes. This, also, he has, after repeated efforts, succeeded in forcing to put on th( 
outward ^arb of law, which its gross violations of the constitution will never sanction, and fron 
which, its speedy explosion on account of its utter impracticability, will soon prove the country': 
happy deliverance. 

This measure is wxcoNSTlTUTIO^'AL, not only because it is not embrace<l in i\\Q specific power. 
of C')ngre.«s, and recognizes the power assumed by the President to ' colkct' and keep the reve 
nue, in violation of an express power given to Congress to collect and keep by its own officer, tbi 
Secretary of the Treasury, whose fiscal reports are ordered to be made to Congress direct — bu 
because it cannot be inferred as an implied power, it being neither necessary nor proper " t( 
aid in conducting the national finances," which it will obstruct instead of aiding; nor tofaciiitat' 
"the obtaining loans on emergency," as it will impede those facilities by the general embarrass 
ments that wiU arise from it; nor will it conduce " to the advantage of trade and industry," bu 
the contiary, by withholding from active circulation the whole amount of the revenue, for i 
great portion of the year, while it is locked up in the vaults of Receivers General. 

It is IMPRACTJCABLE, bccause it convey s conflictir.g and incompatible authority to tlie Secretar 
of the Treasury, the Postmaster General, and the 'J'reasurer of the United States, over the de 
posites in the hands of Receivers General, empowering either to control the entire deposites b\ 
transferring them to any point, or detaining them in despite of one another, and therefore in utte 
derogation of a prompt, regular, and consistent actiim, according to the exigencies of the Govern 
ment — leaving, indeed, the salutary or deleterious interposition of the President in such emer 
gency, to be implied, by another ellbrt of usurpation over law, rather thaa provide for the possibli 
contingency. . 

The bill would also be dnconstitutioxal, even were \i practicable, and could contribute in an^ 
degree as an implied power to accomplish the objects of specific powers, because it involves s( 
vast an expense, and increases Executive power to so dangerous an extent, that it would be th( 
last of all practicable resorts to accomplish those objects consistently with "the common defenci 
and the general welfare of the country," essential to the constitutionality of every law, but whicl 
this puts in imminent jeopardy. On the other hand, without casting about for any other mon 
practicable and economical device, the very institution which has been destroyed in order to erec 
this upon its ruins, was more eificient in every respect, and entirely economical, as it cost lh( 
Government nothing, but paid it a bonus, and, while sustaining itself above "executive dicta 
tion," restrained instead of e?ilarging " Executive power." 

But especially is this law unconstitutional, because it oRiGrxATEn ix the Senate. Th( 
constitution says: "All bills for raisiiig revenue shall originate in the House of Represcnta 
lives." Most of the State constitutions express this inhibition of the Senate thus: "All monet, 
bills shall originate in the House of Representatives." Without insisting that this clause of tht 
State constitutions is the true exponent of the above clause of the federal constitution, (and ii 
has been the practice of Congress so to construe* it,) but confining myself to the straitesi 
sense of the phrase "all bills for raising revenue," it will be manifest,, from the title of the sub- 
Treasury bill, that it is a bill for raising revenue. Its title is, " An act for the collection, safe- 
keeping, transfer, and disbursement of the public revenue." Now, to place the proposition be- 
yond dispute, that a bill for the collection and safekeeping of the revenue must constitute an 
essential and indispensable part of the system of "raising revenue," I will suppose a simple case. 



* The bill fur appropriating ;g3,0C10,000 for fortifications, to provide for a French war, into which General Jackson 
was hurrying us a few years ago, was aOandoaed on account of the objection that it originated in the Senate, 



29 

ippose the constitution were just ijoing into O|)craiion, atul a bill for "raising revenue" were 
out to be enacted for the lirst time : will it be pretended that a bill apportioning the taxes, 
ities, imposts, or excises, would be perfect without a provision for ihc'ir collection and saftkeep- 
S;, whethnr in the same or in a separate bill 1 Such ii provision would assuredly form a part 

the system of "raising revenue;"' otherwise no revenue would be raised. Weil, such a sys- 
Ti has long ago been established : will it, therefore, be pr^tendod that now an attempt to change 
D whole system of cijllection and safekeeping, or even any part of il, is not an essential inter- 
cnce with, abrogation of, or remodeling, the system of "raising revenue?" And, if it be, it 

undoubtedly necessary that such a bill should originate in the House of Representatives. 
?ntleinen of the locofoco stamp may persist in their obstinary, and continue to ])lace thcm- 
ives, as they arc wont to do, above law and the constitution, but there is no gelling rid of the 
ce of demonstration, or the opprobrium of disregr.rding it. 

Yet, notwithstanding the outrages proposed to be perpetrated by this bil^ in a thousand ways, 
r. Van Buren has dared to insult the good sense of the American people by calling it "a 
:ond declaration of indepetidence," and has actually burlesqued the ceremony of signing the 
;red instrument of " .\merican Independ<*nce" by expressly setting apart the holy day of the 
CKTH OF JuLT, at 12 o'clock, to sign this bill of abominations, which, in fact, threatens the 
bversion of the liberties ovir forefathers won with their blood and treasure. And straightway 
r. Ritchie, too, chimes in, and echoes "a second declaration of independence" — /te who had 
ndemned this same bill, when it was first proposed, as "enhancing the Executive patronage 
lich ought to be diminished, and as dangerous to American liberty." 

But this is not all. Mr, Van Buren, under the pressure of embarrassments and panic in 
lich his unaccountable blumlers have involved him, is so far demenied as to issue, in his re- 
nt electioneering letters, a " gross libel ugainst the memory of Washington, by charncterizirg 
Ti as one of the founders of " mkasutiks devised by the friends and advocates of privileged 
iers, for the purpose of pervert in <;; the Government from its pure and legitimate olijects, rest- 
^ all power in the hands of the few, and enablinir them to profit at the expense of the 
i-vr" — as one of those by whose conduct " the few were enabled to enrich themselves by 
inu; the ni^ney wbich bebms;ed to the maxy," and " in clkau violatiox of the spirit of a 
iistitutionaly;/7>^(6//jo«" — as oivpof the founders of "an extensive interest," " deriving wealth 
im the Use of the people's money," "in palpable violatiox of the spirit of the constitu- 
n" — as one whose gross errors President Vax Burkn was to reform by a measure, by means 
which "the management of an important branch of our national concerns, aftf.h a hkpaht- 
tE OF NEAULT HALF A CEXTVRY, Will be brought back to the LETTEit, as well as to the od- 
oi^s s}>irit and intention, of the constitution." 'J'his is the picture of Washingtox, as drawn 

the hand of Vax Bl'uex ! ! Truly the President has, in this instance, gone Loyond his 
'dge to tread in the footsteps of his "illustrious predecessor." That predecessor had, in 1796, 
iiteiited himself with a species of ncs;utive insult to Washtxgtox, by refusing to join in a 
te in the House of Representatives, on the occasion of his final retirement from public life, ex- 
Jssing its sense of his public services. President Van Burkx, true to his promise of imitating 
esident Jacksux, attemj)ts to " perfect the work he had so gloriously begun," by telling the 
nerican People, in substance, that Washington was "a deliberate violator of the eonstitu- 
n" which he had solenmly sworn to obey I This act of fatuous efl'rontery (and injustice) has 
Jsed the indignation of the country so strongly, that any direct defence of it has, so far as we 
ve noticed the papers of the day, been uvoidid even by the most reckless advocates of the 
jsenl administration." — {See the National Intelligencer of August 27.) 

Hf. Mr. Van Bureri the author and perftcler of the great spoils system — The direct spoils 
office only a branch if that system — A hey to the machinery used to bring this whole sys- 
n to perfection, and concentrate it in the hands of the President, consisting of the Press, the 
)st Office, the Armed Force, and the Appointing Power — Their several uses and abuses in 
'. hands of a corrupt Executive, in monopolizing the whole mor>'y-power, and reducing "the 
immonwealth to a spoil." 

It is necessary again to recur back a little beyond the commencement of Mr. \-ar\ Buren's 
reer in the United Slates Senate, in order to begin the review (which runs through this period 
1 he reached the Presidency) of his exploits in the direct "spoils of office," according to the 
finition given in the beginning of the second Section of this period of his life, in which, I 
ve also treated of some of the subjects that belong to the other two branches of that "great 
stem of spoils" to which he has subjected all the resources, public and private, of this great 
public. 

\^'e have seen that Mr. Van Buren, precocious in all the arts of "uniting, harmonizing, and 
reeling" the passions of party, was, at a very early period of his political life, (more than 
enly years ago,) the author and projector of the New York " regency school" of politics called 
e "spoils system ;" that is to say, in the mitigated form of expression used by his biographer, 

' He avowed the principle ihal the dominant pany should always pi^ssess and exercise the official patronage."' 
PR Holland, p. 198.) 



30 

I shall now give a few fuither evidences of his continuance and perfection of that system, 
the various protean shapes which his ingenuity and his opportunities enabled him to give it, 
transferring it from his State to the Federal Government — and fok what object ! 

It is a matter of record in the Post Office Department, that, in 1829, when Mr. Van Bur 
was a candidate for a seat in the United States Senate, to hecome the colleague of Rufus Kir 
whose election he had procured, he canvas-sed with great zeal, upon the proscriptive principle 
the "spoils system," to secure his election to that body, by the .success of his own party in t 
State liCgislature, through the official influence of postmasters of his own selection, to fill t 
places of those he reported to the Postmaster General for removal. Let the following letter s 
fice here as evidence of that fact : 

" Van BureiVs letter to the Hon. Henry Mei^s, requiring the remoral of certain officers in order to secure 
election to the Henate of the United States. 
" My Dear Sir : Our sufferings owing lo iht' rascaliiy of deputy posln;ailers is intolerable, and cries alotiil 
relief. We find it alisolutely impossible to penetrate the interior wiih our papers, and unless you attain them 
two or three prompt removals, there is no limiting the injurious consequences lliat may result from it ; let me thf 
fore, enireat the Postmaster General to do an act of justice, and render us a partial service, by the removal of H- 
of Herkimer, and the appointment of Jabez Kox, Esq.— also, of Hnwell. of Bath, and the appointment of an 
cellent friend, W. B. Rochester, Esq.. a young man of the first respectability and worth in the State— and the 
moval of Smith, at Little falls, and ilie apijointnient c^f HoUister— and ihe removal of Chamberlain, in Oxford, £ 
the appointment of Lot Clark, Esq. I am in extreme haste, and can therefore add no more. Use the enclo: 
papers according to your discretion, and if any thing is done, let it be quickly done, and you may rely upor 
much good may rosull from it. " Yours, affectionately, 

" M. VAN BUREN 
" The Hon. Hensy Meigs. 
" April 4, 1»19." 
Of the subsequent "additional" proscriptive lists furnished in pursuance of the above, a 
other details on that head, it is not material to inquire. He succeeded in obtaining a seat 
the Senate, according to his wishes, by the vote of a small majority of the next Legislatu 
And I believe, with others of infinitely more profound research than myself, "that Mr. V 
Buren camt; into the General Government with an eye fixed upon the Presidency, and will 
determination to reduce to practice in that Government the ethics of the IS'ew York school, a 
means of arriving at his object;" for " he was not long in the Senate before he gave indicatic 
of that [the latter] determination as far as was in his power." Early in the session of 1821-': 
a vacancy having occurred in the post office at Albany, and n being understood that Gen Sc 
mon Van Rensselaer, a gallant soldier of the Revolution and of the late war, was likely to 
appointed to the situation, Mr. Van Biiren interfi-'red to prevent it, and procure a partisan i 
pointment, ns will appear by the following extract from his letter to the Postmaster General, 
which he " united" the concurrence of one or two friends : 

" Knowing, as we do, that the Republicans of the State of New York will reeard it as a matter of ercal im] 
tance that the post office at the seal of Government sliould be in the hands of a gentleman of the sahie polit 
character with tliemselves ; and anxious that they should fully understand the principle which, in this particu 
governs your department, we have felt it to be our duly and our right lo present, on this occasion, that question 
pecifuUy, but distinctly, to your consideration." 

But the Postmaster General, Mr. Meigs, and the President, Mr. Monroe, not being diver 
by this covert threat from their determination to give the appointment to Gen. Van Renssela 
Mr. Van Buren addressed to his friends at Albany a letter of condolence, and pointed to a h( 
in the future ; from which the following is an extract : 

" You have now the same means of judging as ourselves how far you may, with propriety, regard the appointrr 
in this case as deciding, that, in the administration of the Post OlBce Department, political distinctions give 
preference. That you will be disappointed and mortified we can readily believe; but we tnist that you will 
be disheartened. While there are no men in the country more enured to political suffering than the Rfpublic 
of New York, there are none who have stronger reasons to be. satisfied ot the irrejiressible energy of the Democr 
party, and that no abuses of their confidence can long remain beyond their reach and plenary correction. On 
conviction we trust you will repose yourselves, and act accordingly." 

Here, then, we have the satisfaction to lay before the great American Democracy the first 
liberate attempt to desecrate their magnanimous, popular denomination, to the purposes of p£ 
dering to a "spoils faction." The sagacious commentary of the editors of the IVational Int 
ligencer, (August 15,) remarks on this movement, that Mr. Van Buren "failing, through 
coolness and wariness of the two veteran patriots .Monhoe and Meigs, in the attempt to est; 
lish his power in the General Government by a coup de main, had the prudence to change 
tactics, and to pursue his object by paths less direct but more easily practicable." 

After his signal disappointment in the case of the Albany post office, in pursuance of his o 
advice of patient resignation and hope in the future, we notice little or no evidence of Mr. V 
Buren's further action upon the "spoils of office," while in the Senate, until the latter pari 
Mr. Adams's administration. His own State had, in 1824, pronounced Gen. Jackson inco 
petent for the Presidency when her electors cast for Mr. Adams 26 votes, for Mr. Crawfon 
votes, for Mr. Clay 4 votes, and for Gen. Jackson only 1 vote. Of course Mr. Van Buren v 
virtually pledged to the support of Mr. Adams's administration. Moreover, his own Senatoi 
term would expire before another election of President. This explains the restraint he put u| 
himself in taking no open part in the earlier workings of certain conclaves in Congress agai 
. Mr. Adams, preparatory to a second canvass for the Presidency, until after his own re-electi 
to the Senate. " It was enough (sat/s the Mirror, p. 39) to have it known by his conten 



31 ♦ 

ateJ dupes that lie was opposed to the adriiiiiistratton, and dispoecd, under certain undefined eon- 
ingincics, to su[iport the pretensions of General Jackson." The same autiior informs us (p. 
J7) that the "existence and character of these conclaves, by which a powerful |):irly was pra<lu- 
dly formed, involving a majority of the Senate, were first develo[)ed on the Isl of March, 1827, 
>y ihp. vole on t/ie c/ioicc of printer." Previous to this time, we are informed l;y thesTrne author, 
iial Mr. Van Buren had "carefully avoided the xessiou.s of the organized cahiil, and luid caused 
:autionarv monitions ai2,A\i\!il jirevif/l tire cumiitittal (or any candiilate to lie circidaled ihroughout 
lis State. Uncumtnitted himself, he wa.s any bodifs, and, conseqnenlly, evtri/ body's man, 
md was re-e!ectrd to the Senate by a very unanimous vote. The inference was drawn that the 
^ote of Xew York in the next Presidential election was placed in his hands. New importance 
was thence given to his position iit Washington, and he was emboldened more openly, but with 
icarce mor? efliciency, to mingle in the intrigues against the adniini.'-tration, and to appear at 
,he SECUET CAHAL, at which the great combination was effected." — (Mirror, p. 39.) 

'J'his was inilecd a tedious suspense of Mr. Van Buren's cu«itoniary [larticipatioii in the 
'spoils of ofl'ice" for parly purposes, during a whole Senatorial term. But the best he could 
nake of the necessity that imposed inertness upon him was, to be ready at the instant of a pro- 
)itiou3 turn o( his fortune. Being now re-elected for a second term to the Senate, he lost not 
I moment in Inying aside the mask, and seized the occasion of the vote above mentioned for 
)rinter to the Senate on the 1st March, 1827. 

The Political Mirror says, (page 37,) " The nature of this vole is not a matter of inference 
nerciy. It is explained by the testimony of one [Mr. Van Buren himself] who was a party to 
t, and avowed it to be a parly vote." Mr. Van Buren, who had the greatest power in preparing, 
md took the most active part in advocating that vote, distinctly avowed the motive. He said : 

"He had lone Ijeen of opinion that ihe puljlic interesl miL'htlip pronioied. and ihe condition of the press, a.s well 
lire as itirougnom ilie country, improved, and ri'spr-i". lor the Senalo, and cconi my in tlie piiMication of ihp pro- 
:eedincp of the Sonnte heller spcurcd, by a judicious revision of the laws relating to the jiublic priming at large. 
it a more convenient season he hoped the snlijpci would be revised ; and he promised himself ihc best results from 
luch revision as the nature of the sulijecl was susceptible of." 

This avowal of Mr. Van Buren is far less important as it relates to the primary direcf spoils 
)f ojfiee in question, than as it relates to the secondary ivdircet f-poils of offiee then in prr.spect- 
ve. Though tbi' immediate result of his policy was, to elect a ]'arlisaii ot the new [itirly com- 
bination of the Senate by a mire plurality vote ol one, and not by a majority ot the Senate, nfter 
re|ieated bullotings to supersede the editors of the National Intelligencer, who liad advocated the 
jlection of Mr. Crawford, the personal and political friend of Mr. V^un Buren, and who had sup- 
ported the admilll^tration of Mr. Adams as their second choice, whom Mr. Van Buren's own State 
lad preferred for the presidency — and, what is still more remarkable, though the printers, now su- 
jierseded by the new party combination, had been elected the term before with the co-operation 
if Mr. Van Buren, without opposition, and had in the mean time committed no olVenre but to 
maintain their own integrity by rejecting party overtures for their seduction from the support of 
the adminislration, (all of which sullicieiitly declare the covert party malignltv and inveterate 
" purpose ot the spoils" in the princijial actor in this affair,) I say, the secondaiv indirect aspect 
jf the professions with which he urged this vote, was infinitely more portentous oi' the evil con- 
sequences that followed in its train ; and it is on that account that I have taken more pains in 
stating the particulars of it. But the tendency and bearing of the motives avowed on the occa- 
sion, I will, as a specimen of prop liccy real iztd, leave to be explained by the lucid commentary 
af the author of the Political .Mirror, who speaks of it, pp. 37, 38, thus: 

" We have said, thai this is a distinct avowal of the sentiments of th* speaker; 'rut il is lo be nt ."served, thai ihe 
Bfjeaker wa.s Mr. Van Buren, distinguished by his skill in mystification, and his an (jf givine to his sentencrs an 
hermaphrodite character. We draw from Uie declaia:ion the inference— which, consideiirig I\Tr. Van Buren as a 
candidate for llie highest office o( the country, is as important as il is alarmiivi, showing how uiiliniited are his 
ideas of power pertaining lo ilie General Uovernnienl— the inference, thai Mr. Vaii Buren iieeiiis that Conerrss, by 
a ' judicious revision,' (a phra.se admirably appropriatr. Iron) its oljscuriiy and in.iefiiiiteripss, to the assumpiioii of 
forbidden powrrs.) may improve, i. e. direct an^l coiilrul, the press throughout the United States '" 

That sagacious author goes on to remark, that Mr. Van Buren's text "was fully exfdained 
by the |)ractical commentary which was immediately given to it by the dismissal of Gales and 
Seaton (as supjiorters of the administration) from the employment of the Senate, and by the 
subsequent distribution of t\\e public priutini^ and all other official fut^ors by the administration 
of General Ja.ckson, of to/iich Mr, Van Buren is the vital spirit as he was the creator." But 
I am astonished it should escape the inquiry of our author, what "res[>cct for the Senate" Mr. 
Van Buren coulu desire " to secure from the Press," compaliblp ivith the freedom of that palla- 
dium of our liberties. 

It cannot but be, now, a matter of curiosity to many, to hear what the elements of this cabal 
said on the subject of •' Executive patronage," which they proposed to " regulate by law," the 
session before the above vote, when that combination was only in its forming state, and of which 
Mr. Van Buren, as we have just seen, was the occult, clrmdestine, master spirit. An extract 
of the report (May 4, 182G) of a comniiltee of the Senate composed of M essrs. Benton, Macon, 
Van Buren, White, Findlay, Dickerson, Holmes, Hayne, and R. M. Jidinfon, appointed "to 
inquire into the expediency of amending the constitution," and further instructed " to inquire into 



* 32 

the expediency of diminishing or regulating the patronage of the Executive of the Unitec! 
States," with leave to report by bill or otherwise, will show that Mr. Von Buren and his asso 
ciates of the majority of the committee did affect to denounce the abuse of Executive patronag« 
or the " spoils system," through a sheer purpose of raising a false alarm against the administra- 
tion, when such a system actually did not exist, and as yet never had existed in the Federal 
Government. The said committee reported, on the day mentioned, six bills, viz: 
1. " A bill to reiji.laie the publication of the laws t,f the UnitPd States, and of public advertisements." 
-. A 11 secure in office the faithful collectors and disbursers of the revenue, and todisplace defaulters " 
o. A bill to regulate the appointment of postmasters." 

4. "A bill to regulate the appointirr^nt of cadets." 

5. "A Inll to regulate the appointment of niidsiiipmen." 

6. "A bill to prevent military and naval officers from being dismissed the service at the pleasure of thePresident." 
_ Now, in order to understand the full purport of these bills as nearly as may be, and the bare- 
faced hypocncy of certain members of the committee who framed them, and have since been 
loremost m sharpening the appetites and letting loose the hell hounds of the whole system of 
the spoils, take the following beautiful extract from the report accompanying said bills : 

* * * " The committee must then take things as they are; not bein? able to lav the axe at the root of the tree 

o^?re"s!d .ft" hel'Z'f TT' "'t'''"'^' '*,!"' ^'™"^'^'^'- N''^ '^^i"? «L'l'^ '« reforn/the a^^titmi ,n in the dect^n 
ol Resident, they must go to work upon his powers, and trim down these by statutory enactments, whenever it 
can be done by law, and w^th a just regard to the proper efficiency of the Government. For a, s ™^^^^^ 
reported the six bills which have been euuireraietl. 'fhey do not pretend to have exhausted tL'uMectbta only 
o have seized a few of its prominent points. Tl>ey have only touched in four places, the vast and pervaclii^sy^^^ 
n^m of federal executive patronage: the Press-the Post Office-the Armed /orce-and the App iS P^v■er 
They are few compared to the wh.Oe number of poims, vital to the liberties of the countrv' ^IeP??ss is put 
foremosl, bf cause it is the moving power of liuman action. The Post-office is the hantl maid of the pres, f he 
Armed Force is Us executor. And the Appointing Power is the ' directress <,f the whole '" ' * * ♦ "In the 
country for which the committee acts, the Press, (with some exceptions,) the Post office, the Armed Force and -the 
Appointmg Power, are in the hands of the President and the Presidem himself is not in the hlrl^Js of The 'people '^ 
If the reader will contrast the subsequent conduct of the party with this delectable exposition 
of the practicable patronage of the Executive, (practicable in the opinion of the Van Burfen ma- 
jority of the committe, for it had never been used and was not considered, morally, practicable 
to use a, by the wisest and purest men in the earlier davs of the republic,) he will at once have 
a key, not only to Mr. Van Buren's " hermaphrodite expression" of his sentiments about a judi- 
cious " revision and " improvement of the Press here and throughout the United States -'but 
taken with their forbearance to pre.-^s those bills to a final pas.sage into law, he will perceive that 
they were, With the report, only intended as an eJfctioneering demonstration against the then 
administration, (which Mr. Van Buren's cabal had resolved, as it was profanely expressed by 
another prominent member, Richard M. Johnson, now Vice President, that "it .'-hoiild be put 
down, were it as pure as the angels which stand at the right hand of Got}."— Political Mirror 
p. •:!.) Foi:, the sequel of their conduct has shown that the whole of those resources of 
the "spois system, direct, indirect, and remote, should they ever fall into their own hands 
were too highly appreciated to be thus "pruned and lopped off" bv legishitive enactments at 
their instance. Taking these engines of the spoils, as afterwards used by the corrupt dvnasty 
which succeeded the administration of Mr. Adams, in the order in which the party chieftains 
arranged them while acting as legislators, with Mr. Van Buren at their head, as " harmoiiizer 
and director, I shall give a specimen of their plan of "revision and improvement of the Press " 
(heir uses of the "Post Office Department," and of the "Armed Force;" when, finally I shall 
come to the subject of the spoils of office proper, as their fourth object of practicable Executive 
PATnoyAGE in the "Appointing Power." 

The specimen I select in regard to the improvement of the Preas, is from a pirty witness of 
their own, exposing the agency of one of Mr. Van Buren's most accredited lieutenants, whom 
he has recently deputized from the Post Office Depurtment, to act as generalissimo of his party 
organized Press here and throughout the Union. It relates to the party drilling which the edi- 
torial corps friendly to the administration were fated to undergo, upon the contemplated removal 
of the deposites, as upon all other important party measures that are ever contemplated by their 
chieftain. James G. Bennett, Esq., one of the editors friendly to the administration at the 
time, feeling himself insulted by the course of dictation practised towards him by the cabal at 
Washington, made an exposition of this "influence behind the throne," in a series of let- 
ters to the public shortly after the date of those impertinent instructions which he received direct 
from Amos Kendall and R. M. Whitney. The editors of the National Intelligencer com- 
menced the republication of Bennett's expose in their paper of the 7th January 1834, introdu- 
cing It to the public, with an editorial article, in the tirst and concluding paragraphs of which 
they observe: "Our readers will not need to be informed, that in a series of essays addressed to 
them on 'the Bank Question' in August and September last, we endeavored to make them ac- 
quainted with the char8,cter and objects of a cabal, then laboring to effect the removal of the Pub- 
lic Deposites, with the ulterior object of crushing the United States Bank. In those essays we 
shadowed out, but too faintly, we fear, the conse.iuences which would follow the consummation 
ol their wishes and labors. We did not then know so much as we now do, of the length and the 
depth of their machinations; nor did we then suppose t'nat the « Government' of the United 
St.ates was so completely under the influence of their counsels, as subsequent disclosures seem 
to indicate too clearly to be doubted. ♦ * » 



33 

" The Pennsy Ivaiiian is the title of the loremost administration paper in the city of Philadelphia, 
of which, our readers may rememher, Mr. James G. Bennett (formerly connected with tho 
Courier and Enquirer) was recently tiie editor. Having been unceremoniously ousted from that 
post, for want of sufficient pliability of conscience for its managers, he has felt it to be incum- 
bent on him to raise the curtain, and exhibit the machinations of as reckless a band af confede- 
rates as perhaps e\ier undertook to turn the atTairs of a great (jovernment to their own personal 
ndvantagc. This he has begun in a series of letters, of which the three first now lie before us. 
If we were not so pressed by other matters, demanding a place in our columns, we should con- 
eider it due to Mr. Ben.vett to give theio entire. But, lo spread the es.sential part of them be- 
fore our readers, we arc obliged to content ourselves with such extracts as Kerve to throw light 
on the present posture of political affairs, and to expose the wickedness and wantonness with 
which the public intcre.^ts have been jilayed with by the underlings who have possessed and 
abused the conlidcncc of the Chief Mat;islrate. These extracts we subjoii), purposelv abstaining 
from comment, except merely to say, that Mr. B. ha.s, so far as he has gone, fully redeemed his 
pledge to the public, and vindicated his own honesty of purpose." The editors of the Intelligen- 
cer then proceed to give the extracts from Bennett, containing two letters Irom Amos Kendall 
and one from R. M. Whitney, with remarks of Mr. Bennett upon each. For want of room I 
can only copy the Intelligencer's extract of Mr. Bennell"'s general remarks on the topics involv- 
•ed, leaving out Kendall and \\ hitney's Jotters with Mr. Bennett's remarks upon each. 

Extracts from Bennett's letters.—" AiidiPw Juckscm was raised lo the liighf st slalion which a free ppoplo 
can bestow in 16i3-'v!9. * * * A piiiall l.aiul of desperaip men, iiniipr thp e.xciieiiiein ami triumph of his nrst 
eleciiiiii, having succrpded to worm theioselvrs int'.i the subordinate oflices at AVashincton, have availed themselves 
nf ; hat very jioijularity and success lo create one of ilie most ferocious tyrannies thai ever rcareJ its head in a 
country callinp itself free <ind inlclllgent. 

" Durins lUe last two or three years, ihis unseen irresfionsiblo iKidy of iniMvidiials, consislinj principally of sub- 
ordinate otHcers of the Extxulive Government at WashiniiUm and elsewhere, have created a confederacy and or- 
ganized a power, w hich has for its purpose an entire chance in the Government of tho United States, as establish- 
ed by the patriots (f the revului ion, and guarantied by the principles of the exislins constilulion. » ♦ • This 
irres(X)nsible cabal, who control and write for the oflicial journal called the Globe, have made, in twelve months 
more rapid strides lo subvert public liberty— destroy the checks of llic constitution— degrade Congress— disgrace 
the cabinet— subvert the liberty of the press, than a nriililary leader, with fifty lhous;ind bayonets at his back, could 
have achieved in twenty years, in ihe face of a brave people, who knew their rights and could defend iheni. * ♦ * 

'• By the succe.s8 of such a scheme, the whole frame of the Government woulcfbo reversed at a blow, and hence- 
forth Congress would be reduced to a couple of contemptible recording corporations, ready lo sanclion the decree* 
of tho temporary dictator, whoever he nn:;hl be. 

" One of the principal elements of this conspiracy, is the organizalion q[ the Govenment officers and Ihe news- 
paper press tkniushoul the country, in the shape of a pemianent body ol police, empowered to circulate tho de- 
crees of the centra] conspirators, denounce the refractory, destroy the character of the independent, and elevate 
the power and prerogatives of tho E.vecutivp, without the slightest regard to the constitution or laws of the country. 

" Takin;; into consideration the state of the public mind— the situation of the country— the personal feelin'-s of 
the President— the prosress of [wwer, there never was so favoralde an opportunity since the revolution for the en- 
largeHienl of the Presidential prerogativ(^-the destruction of the constitution— the degrailalion of Conriess and 
the ultimate erection of a dictatorship, or rather a votoship upon the ruins of all. ' 

"Tho Washington Globe is the orcan of the prime conspirators. Its ostensible editor is F.F.Blair, * * ♦ but 
the principal editor is Amos Kendall, the 4th Auditor, who, it is believed, also participates in the profits of the es- 
tablishment. * * * He is the master spirit of the confederacy, and contrives as well as executes the general 
plans of spoliations, and the individual executioner of the relVactory, be he either a cabinet ;i inister, member of 
Consrress, or a newspaper editor. * * * Blair is ♦ ♦ ♦ Whitney is ' a jiicker up of loose papers,' a clean- 
er of little things about banks, which Kendall shapes into editorial paragraphs, for the latter is entirely ienoranl of 
the first principles about ;.K.nking and currency, and scarcely ever attempts to talk on the subject without news- 
paper au'hority before him. 

5;5"' When a new editor of any standing or talents begins business, he is immediately written to by the conspira- 
tors at Waahingum. in the name of the President, or of the republican party, and a course is marked out for hi« 
especial guidarice. The following letters show the beginning of the came which these aucusl personages attempt- 
ed to play with me, through the last summer, until they discovered I claimed an entire inde[ endence in the man- 
ogemeni of my paper, and chose lo think and aci for myself. This discoveiy brjiighl out their whole power 
*gain8l iiic," ic. Ice. 

The extent to which '*thk Post Ofeice" has been used as an cnj^ine of ihe spoils party in 
< thousand ways, since their cabal in the Senate affected to cry out against those abuses which 
ihey prefigured to tho public before they existed, ought to l)c sufficiently known to relieve me 
from any details here, save only to say, in general terms, that, in a very short time after these 
hypocritical refornrers came into power, the pecuniary resources of the Department were reduced 
from the flourishing condition of $202,81 1 40, surplus on hand, to a deficit of ji4 50, 000 indebt- 
edness, in consequence of ille.gal borrowing from the banks, to meet the profligate waste in pay- 
ing electioneering agents and party favorites under the pretence of fx/ra.s due to mail contractors, 
for the most part fraudulently incurred. It may well be supjwsed that the whole operations of 
the Department corresponded very much with the corruption of its fiscal branch. — (See the re- 
sults of some half dozen reports of com niittees of investigation of both Houses of Congress since 
1831.) But of its abuses of the franking privilege, to subserve the purposes of a corrupt Exec- 
utive in manufacturing and dictating opinions for public adoption, by disseminating them in an 
imposing manner through the channels of the mail, I will give a -single instance, to show how 
truly the cotnmiltee of the Senate in 1827, under the magic wand of Mr. Van Burcn, apprecia- 
ted the Post Office as '*the handmaid" of his hevisf.ii phess. It is a copy of an engraved or 
lithographed letter, (except the date and signature,) which may be printed by thousands, (and 
thousands of other forms suited to other subjects may have been adapted to their desires as well 
as this,) requiring only the date and signature of the executive officers at the seal of Government, 
3 



34 

using and abusing the franking privilege, to flood the country with the edicts of the executive 
junta, "issued or to be issued." 'J''he original is on file at the Madisonian oiSce, whose editor 
has been favored with it by some one of the persons to whom it had been addressed. 

" Washington City, January 31, 1S38. 

" Sir : I enclose you, herewith, a prospectus for the Extra Globe, with the first numlier as a sample. Thesp pa- 
pers will ex|)laiu themselves. The cheap rate at which the Extra Globe will be published will enable every mau 
in the country to become a subscriber. Fur a single dollar he can obtain a weekly newspaper, published at the 
seat of the National Government, containiiii the latest political and foreign news. If a number of persons choose 
to unite and forward a larger sum, the subscription to each, as you will perceive by the terms of the prospectus, will 
be less than a dollar. Whilst our political of)ponem3 control a majority of the public presses in every Slate, it is 
believed, in the Union, and have in their employ a corps of letter- writers stationed in this city ami elsewhere, who 
are daily misrepr sentint' public men and public measures, it becomes important, to counteract their effect, that a 
clieap medium tiirou^li which true information may be conveyed to the people should be patronized. The Globe, 
it is well-known, is the leading democratic paper ; and, because it is so, great efforts liave been made by the federal 
party to impair its just influence on public opinion. They have not succeeded. 

" Let me hope that you will take some interest in giving to the p;.xtra Globe an extensive circulation in your 
neighborhood. ' " 1 am, very respectfully, your obedient servant, H. L. ELLSWORTH." 

The intelligent reader will perceive that the scandalous allegations in the latter part of the 
above letter are more descriptive of the " hirelings" of the administration than of their opponents, 
to whom the_v falsely and maliciously apply them. Other instances, in abundance, of the sub- 
serviency of the Post Offick to the purposes of the spoilers are familiar to most persons con- 
versant with the history of the times : therefore, I ha-^ten to a brief survey of the next count — 
the subserviency of the " Aiim>;i) Fouce" in the hands of a corrupt Executive. Moreover, the 
style of this letter declares it to be the composition of the then Postmaster General himself, Amos 
Kendall, being the counterpart of his secret circular on the same subject. 

The reader should perpetually bear in mind the remark of the cornmittee of Mr. Van Buren's 
friends of the Senate, in 1827, that "the Press is put foremost, because it is the moving power 
of human action" — that "the Post Officf, is the handmaid of the Press" — that "the Armed 
FoucF. is the executor" — and that "the Appointing Power is the directress of the ivhole." 
Let him then turn his eyes to the means resorted to in order to insure that the " An>iEU 
Force" shall be "the executor" of " their decrees, issued or to be issued," through the Press, 
the Post Office, or otherwise, under the direction of the "Appointing Power," the President I 

The " Armed Foiict" of the regular standing army has already been increased nearly double, 
under tlie patronage and recommendation of Mr. Van Buren, since he has been commander-iii- 
c/u'e/of the army! But, in his annual message of the 24th of December last, he has gone the 
whole figure. Speaking of that part of the report of the Secretary of War, accompanying his 
message, detailing a plan of an urjned force of 200,000 men, he said to Congress: 

" I cannot rccommeiid too strongly to your consideration the plan submitted by that officer [the Secretary of 
War] /or tlie organization of Vie militia of the United States." 

Mr. Van Buren and Mr. Poinsett have both, at the instance of Mr. Ritchie, greatly falsified 
the origin and object of tliat " pl.vn," in order to extricate themselves from the embarrassment 
it has thrown them into with the people, who shudder at the idea of an enormous armed force 
in times of peace. I shall not waste time to show the absurdity of those equivocations and falsi- 
fications of dates, «Scc., but proceed to exhibit, briefly, the objects of so indnense an armed force, 
to be distributed, in proportion to population, throughout the country. 

Having made pretty clean business of destroying the commerce of the country by their finan- 
cial blunders and quack experiments upon the banking institutions, the revenue from imports, 
they begin to perceive, is insufficient to defray the current expenses of the Government, and that 
direct taxation and excises will, of necessity-, have to be resorted to, whether these consequences 
formed a part of their original design against the United States Bank or not. Preparatory to the 
latter measure, the process of assessing the property of every description throughout the United 
States, by the census-takers, has been ordered, so as to embody the necessary information on 
which to compute and levy a direct tax. This project had been progressing with but little 
agitation of the public mind, until the new plan of an additional armed force of 200,000 men, 
and the demi-official insinuati'^ns of Messrs. Rhett and Pickens of South Carolina, and Mr. 
Jones of New York, induced some of the friends of liberty to apprehend that there was some 
ground of alarm. 

It now appears that the object of the armed force of 200,000 men is in part to enforce the collec- 
tion of the direct tax, should it meet resistance, as it purely would, in some parts of this yet inde- 
pendent country. I subjoin the testimony in an extract from the "Gaspee Torch-light." 

"Isaac Hill, now receiver-general for New England, in a p-ilitical lecture delivered before the Van Buren asso- 
ciation of Providence (R. I.) last March, declared "that the expenses of the General Government sl)ould be paid by 
a direct lax upon property.' He proclaimed this as one of the final measures of the administration party. That 
there should be no mistake about this matter, we, soon after the delivery of that lecture, and while the declarations 
of Mr. Hill were fresh in the recollection of all, obtained the following certificate, signed by eight highly respecta- 
ble gentlemen of this city, who heard the lecture ; which certificate was, last April, published m a communication 
of ours in the Providence Journal. It was nut the7i, has not sirice, and cannot now, with truth, be denied : 

' '■ Providence, March 25, 1S40. 

" ' We, the undersigned, freemen of this city, hereby certify that we attended a 1 cture delivered by Isaac Hill, 
of New Hampshire, before and at the request of the Demecratic Association of said city, in the masonic hall of Prov- 
idence, on the evening of the sixth instant; and that, in said lecture, said Isaac Hill did state positively and distinct- 
ly the following to be among the true principles of genuine Van Buren democracy, viz : 

" ' 1. The abolition, not only of all protective duties, but of all import duties, and the abolition of the whole cus- 
tom-house system. 



35 

" '2. That Ihe expenses of the General Governmenl should be |miU \>y a ilirect las u|ion property, &c. 

" '3. Thai gold and silver was ihe only •■urreni;y which ihe General Governnienl had the consliiutional powor lo 
provide for ihe people of ihis ciiuniry ; and ihal Congress had no power to create a system of national currency and 
exchanjps by means of a national bank, (such as Washincton recommended in irui,and Madison approved in'lblG.) 

"'4. Thai all disiri'oution acts were wrong, and calculated lo corrupt iho Slates and ihe people, though he did 
not attempt to show why ihe money should be more corrupting in their hands than in the hands of the Gemoral Gov- 
ernmeni. 

'• ' 5. That no division of ihe proceeds of the sales of ihe public lands amo;ig the several States oug)ii therefore lo 
be made or allowed lo be maile by the General Government. 

" ' i. He boasted tliat his Van Buren friends in New Hampshire had attained to that happy state of democratic 
purity and perfection, that they coidd now lake strong and decided ground in favor of the ntjove principles and 
measures of the Van Buren party — that they were opposed to a tariff —opposed to a national bank— opposed lo any 
divisioii of thn proceeds of loe sales of the public lands* amons: the several Slates. 

" ' We understo >od "Sir. Hill to distinctly lav down the above prinriplP9 and diicirinos as thf true principles of 
the present Van Buren democratic party. ' ' BEXONl COOKIC. JOSEPH SWKKT. 

T. I). GOODHUE. N. S. DRAPER. 
\V:\I. J. H.ARRIS. MARTIN ROBINSON. 
GEO. W. TYLER. JOHN L. NOVES.' " 

But to insure the olicilience of the armed force tlius propo.'sed, and prevent them from co-op- 
oratitig with their fcllow-citizeiiH against federal misrule and oppressiim, they are, according to 
the pl.m of the I're.-iidcnt and Mr. Poinsett, to he sul'jectcd to "the regulations of the army." 
Now, W this does not constitute thai armed force a part of the standing army, then ihey arc stiH 
entitled to he called citizen-militiamen. It then results that, if the President may thus avoid the 
odium of proposing a standing army of 200,000 men, he must encounter the odinm, not less 
emhnrrassing, tif reviving the "sedition law" amtmg us, to the extent of the application proposed 
of those regulations of the. army, of which the fifth, sixtli, and ninth articles are more oppres- 
sive to the citizen than the "sedition law," and could only be politic as regulations oi an army 
in time of war, viz : 

"Art."). Any officer or soldier who shall use contemptuous or disrespectful words a«ainst the President of iho 
United States, aiiainsl the Vice President thereof, against the Congress, or any of the United States in which they 
may be (juarlered, if a coinmissioned officer, shall be cashiered, or punished as a co urt-martial slial 1 direct ; if a non- 
commissioned officer or soldier, shall sutler such punishment as shall be inflicted on him by the judgment of a cour 
martial. 

"Art. 6. Any officer or soldier who shall behave himself with contempt or disrespect towards his commanding ol" 
ficcr shall be punished .accordins to the nature of his otlence, liy the judgment of a court martial." 

''Article 9. Any officer or soldier who shall strike his superior officer, or draw or lift up any weapon or offer any 
violence against him, being in the execution of lus office, on any pretence whatever, or shall disobey any lawful 
command of his siiperi.ir officer, .sliall'suflVr drath, or such punishment a.s shall, according to the nature of his offence, 
be inflicted upon him bythe sentence of a courl-martial." 

Suffice it to say that similar offences of " contemptuous writing, speaking, or publishing, 
against the President, the Congress," or other authorities, "with the intiiition to defame or 
bring them into disrepute, " were punishable by thk. skdition law with " fine not exceeding 
two thousand dollars, anil imprisonment not exceeding two years." Thus, it is placed beyond 
the reach i>f the most daring mendacity to lieny, with semblance of truth or credibility, that the 
President has proposed to organize a standing arm}' of 200,000 men, or to revive the "sedition 
law" to that extent, but in a more tyrannical form than ever. 

Let us now, in the last place, jiay our respects to Mr. Van Burcn's further agency in bringing 
his " regency spoils system" to embrace the " Appoivtixg PowK.ti" of the Federal Government, 
that " directress of the whole" system of spoils, by which, alter the example of those demagogues 
who subverted the Greek republics more tiinri 2,000 years ago, he has made " politics a trade, 
and the commonwealth a .s/;o;7." [Jnder the "magic direction" of Mr. Van Buren, (as his 
biographer terms it,) the same men who contrived those bills and report above quoted, with their 
party associates in the Senate, took early opportunity to reserve the spoils of office, that vacancies 
and other means allorded, for the disposal of the coming administration of .\ndrew Jackson ; and 
thus materially aided, by a tSenatorial lead, in tempting (Jeneral Jackson from the broad high- 
way, the long beaten track of Republicanism, which he had pledged himself to follow, in ex- 
terminating the monster, " party spirit;" for exam{)le : 

When the nomination of the honornble John J. Crittenden was made to the Senate, on the 
18th Deiember, 1828, to fill a vacancy on the bench of the Supreme Court, it was order^-d, bv a 
party vote, to li(» on the table; where it did lie, till (Jeneral Jackson, nearly four months after, 
had an oi)portunity to fill the vacancy by the appointment of Judge McLean. 

♦ " In regard to the disposal of the public lands," says Holland, page 23S, " a topic of ereal interest and great diffi- 
culty, the Sillowing remarks of Mr. Van Buren were made on a motion to ask for information, in the Senate, May 
18, 18-:G : 

" Mr. Van^uren said." * * * " No man could render the country a greater service than he who 
should devise som'" plan by which the United States tnieht be relieved from the ownership of this property, by some 
equitable mode. He would vote for a prup siiion lo vest tho lands in the Stales in which they s'.ood. on some just 
and equitable terms, a.s related to the other Slates in the confederacy. He honed that, after having full information 
on the su!iject, thoy would be able to eftVri that great object. He believed tliat if those lands were disposed of at 
once to the several States it would be satisfactory to all !" 

A more visionary (x^litician, selling at naught all the wisest counsi^ls and acts of our ancestors, never lived. The 
Slates, severally, once owned these lands, but to settle and harmonize iheir possible conflicting interests, nobly 
surrendered them lo the common stock, to the Union ; and Mr. Van Buren's proposition would ii w involve a great- 
er discord than could possibly have arisen out of the lormer cont'.iiion of inis properly. Indeed, it seemeth that 
nothing is pood till it is remodeled by I\Ir. Van Buren ! ! Thus it is with all ^cacks 1 ! ! 



36 

It would seem that the glorious period for which Mr. Van Buren recommended his friends at 
Albany to live in hope, and not be disheartened, was now beaming on his gladdened vision ; 
and the whole country sadly knows how he regaled himself and his spoils party, when the day 
of his long desired fortunes was confirmed. Among his first acts, when he became Secretary of 
State, as a personal reward for his influence in giving the whole clectorial vote of New York to 
General Jackson, or in discharge of a political debt to the State for the same service, was that 
prescriptive measure of removing, at a sweep, nearly all the clerks of the State Department, 
among whom were Mr. Fendall, Mr. Slade, Mr. Thruston, Mr. Brown, Mr. Saiith, with some 
three or four others from the Patent Office, and filling their places with party favorites, as did 
his exemplar, Amos Kendall, in the Fourth Auditor's office. 

Shortly after this commencement, Mr. Van Buren showed his alacrity at the work of desola- 
tion, by his influence in another department, the Post Ofiice, the only other that adopted his ex- 
cesses. It was scarcely known to a spoils friend of his in Louisiana that he was appointed 
Secretary of State, when that friend, a Mr. Overton, addressed him a letter dated 2l8t March, 
1829, requesting his influence in procuring the removal of certain othccrs in that department ; to 
which Mr. Van Buren returned the following answer, expressedin a hreafh, dated April 20, 1829 : 

" My dear sir : I have the honor of acknowledging the rec.pipl of ynurs nf ihe 2!sl iiUimo, and of informing 
you ihai the rt-movdls and apfioinliripnis which you recommended were made on the day your leller was receiveiT. 
" With respeci, your friend, &c. 

" M. VAN BUREN," 

The guillotine never severed the head from the body of its victims in the terrific days of Dan- 
ton, Marat, and Robespierre, with equal haste, in its greatest thirst for blood. 

If these instance.-^ did not suffice to show that the whole mania of the spoils system, practised 
in the name of General Jackson, was of Van Buren origin, as he was of General Jackson's ad- 
ministration *' the spirit and the creator," I could at least give ample testimony of his improve- 
ment upon it, by his practice s^ince he has, by ihe foulest ineans, succeeded to the Presidency. 
His wanton removals of faithful and capable officers, and his appointment of party favorites in 
their places, some of them known to be infamous, his retention of notorious defaulteiy, and his 
declaration that it is less objectionable for individuals to use the public money, [by their own as- 
sumption,] than that corporate institutions should use it, [by the permission of the Government,] 
and, finally, his further declaration that "rotation in office was a part of his system," i e. to 
make dismissals and appointments at his will and pleasure, on spoils principle, without regard 
to the good of the public service, would 'suflScienlly establish his hearty adoption, if there were 
not already exhibited full evidence of his paternity, of the whole system. 

Without dwelling, in detail, upon the thousands of examples of this abuse of usurped power, 
the doctrine •'yf Executive right under which they have been practised, taken with its fearless and 
wanton execution, proves that the moxet poweb, not only to the full extent of the appropria- 
tions for the civil list, but for disbursements of every description whatever, for the current ex- 
penses of the Government, is assumed and exercised by the President, by virtue of his control of 
the tenure of office of those receiving and disbursing the same: and not only this, in its simple 
amount, but the same infinitely multiplied, inasmuch as when the appointments and salaries 
are once assigned to officers, these being tenants-at-will of the President, be excrci.scs the con- 
trol of the money power not only to that amount, when first bestowed, but in the compeund 
ratio of its perpetual renewability every instant afterwards, the actual amount of which, in the 
hands of such a man as Mr. Van Buren, cannot be computed by the greatest adept in arithmeti- 
cal calculations. 

It would not be inappropriate here to ask, whence Mr. Van Buren derives the "removing 
powEH ?" It is not granted to the President by the constitution — and Mr. Van Buren is the 
advocate of a strict construction of powers, according to the letter : if it be alleged that it has 
been acted on long enough to give it the weight of an exprees grant — which is not true — yet the 
usage of precedent has no authority with him, for he condemns all who have been acting, for a 
half century, on the principles of construction by which our whole financial system was put in 
motion. Nor does he hold with the doctrine of any power whatever being inherent in an office ;, 
for this doctrine was very ingeniously (if without sense) opposed by him, in the discussion of 
the famous Foote's resolution, when he denied the inherent right of the presiding officer of the 
Senate to call to order, however disorderly any member might be on the floor of the Senate. If, 
then, the removijig puwcr be not granted to the President by the constitution — if it be not an 
implied and inherent executive right — if it cannot be sanctioned by mere usage and precedent for 
a half century — I would ask, again, whence is it derived 1 «. 

I have said, parenthetically, that the uemoving poaveti was not considered to be a legitimate 
or constituti(mal power of the Executive, by most of the wisest and purest statesmen, in the 
earlier days of the republic. When the subject of the removing power was under discussion 
in the House of Representatives, June 16th and 17th, 1789, (being the 1st session of the 1st 
Congress,) it was ably argued that it was co-orrfma/e with the appointing poweh, and that 
the Senate had the same right to participate with the President in the one as in the other. This 
discussion took place on " The Bill fur establishing an Executive Department, to be denomi- 



37 

naied the Department of Fvreigii AJfairs." 'I'lie first i-lausp, after stating tlie title "(' tlu- ofticer 
and his duties, had these words : " To be removable from office by the President of the United 
States." 

It is obvious to every discernment that the insertion of this clause fully declared the absence 
of a constitutional or inherent power in the Executive to make removals, which would render 
this clause superfluous, or rather a nei^alion of ih;it power, when not recognised by law. Many 
meinliers who denied the existence of the power were averse to granting it in any case, and 
therefore proposed to strike from the bill this clause granting the power in this case. It was, 
however, retained as a legislative grant of power over the tenure of this office by a vote of 34 
to 20. 

"Mr. WuiTK, of Virginia, said: The constitution gives the President the poweii of nomi- 

• 5ATIN0 and, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, appoixtino to office. As 
' I conceive the power of appointing and dismissing to be united in their natures, and a prin- 
' cipic that never was called in question in any government, I am adverse to that part of the 
'clause which subjects the Secretary of Foreign Affairs to be removed at the will of the Presi- 
♦dent." * * »'• • • • • • • 

• * "Mr. Madison, of Virginia, said: * * The constitution affirms that the execu- 
' tive power shall be vested in the President. Are there exceptions to this proposition ? Yes, 

• there are. The constitution says that, in appointing to i>ffice, the Senate shall be associated 
' with the Prtsident, unle.-s in the case of inferior offices when the law shall otherwise direct. 
' Have we a right to extend this exception ! I believe not." * * "The que-lioti now re- 
' solves itself into this: Is the power of displacing an executive power?" [Having already said 
' it was a power " incident to that department," he went on to say :] " I conceive that if any 

• power whatever is in its nature executive, it is the power of appointing, overseeing, and cnn- 
' trolliyig those who execute the laws. If the constitution had not qualified the power of the 
' President in appointing to oince, by associating the Sevate with him in that business, would 
' it not be clear that he would have the right, by virtue of his executive power, to make such 

• appointments?" &LC. &c. 

Hence, Mr. Madison concluded that, as the constitution did not also expressly qualify the re- 
moving power, by associating the Senate with the President in that regard, this " inherent power" 
is selt'-operative in the Executive : to which Mr. Jackson re[)lied with great force and resistless 
power of argument ; from which the following extract may be deemed as prophetic : 

"Mr. Jacksox, of (Georgia, said: As a constitutional q\iestion, it is of great moment, and 
' worthy of full discussion. I am, sir, a friend to the full exercise of all the powers of Govern- 
' ment, and deeply impressed with the necessity there exists of having an energetic Executive. 

• But, friend as I am to the efficient Government, I value the liberties of my fellow-citizens be- 

• yond every other consideration ; and, where I tind them endangered, I am willing to forego 
' every other blessing to secure them. I hold it as good a maxim as it is an old one, * of two 
' evils to choose the least.' 

"It has been mentioned that in all Governments the executive magistrate had the [inherent] 
' power of dismissing officers under him. This may hold good in Europe, where monarchs 
'claim their powers jure divi no, but it never can be admitted in America, under a constitution 
'delegating enumerated powers. It requires more than a mere ipsi dixit lo demonstrate that 
' any power is, in its nature, executive, and consequently given to the President of the United 
•States by the present constitution. But, if this power is incident to the executive branch of 
' the Government, it does not follow that it vests in the President alone, because he alone does 
' not possess all executive powers. The constitution has lodged the power of forming treaties, 
' and all executive business, I presume, connected therewith, in the President, but it is qualified 
' ' by and with the advice and consent of the Senate,' provided two-thirds of the Senate agree 

• therein. From this, I infer that those arguments are dime away, which the gentleman from 
' Virginia (Mr. Madi.-^on) used to prove, that it was contrary to the principles of the constitu- 

• tion that we should blend the executive and legislative powers in the same body." • • • 

" It has been observed that the President ought to have this poiverto remove u man when he 
« becomes obnoxious to the people ov disagreeable to himself. Auk we thkv to have all the 
' officehs thk MF.nK creatuhes of the I'iiesidext ? This thirst if power will introduce a 
' Treasury bench into the House, and we shall have ministers obtrude upon us to govetn and 

• direct the measures of the legislature, and to support the influence of their master , and shall 
•we establish a difl'erent influence between the people and the President ? I suppose these cir- 

• cumstances must take place, because they have tak^n place in other countries. 'I'he executive 

• power falls to the ground in England, if it cannot be supported by the Parliament ,• therefore, 

• a high game of corruption is played, and a majoriiy secured to the ministry by the introduction 
' of placemen and pensioners. 

"The gentlemen have brought forward arguments drawn from possibility. It is said, that 

• our secretary of foreign alfairs may become unfit for his office by a fit of lunacy, and therefore 

• a silent remedy should be applied. It is true, such a case may happen, but it may also happen 
' where there is no power of removing. Suppose the President should be taken with a fit of 



38 

• lunacy, would it be possible by such arguments to remove him 1 I apprehend he must remain 
« in office during his four years. Suppose the Senate should he seized with a Jit of lunacy, and 
' it was to extend to the Hmine of Rcprei^eiitatives, what couUl the people do kut hXuuiiK this 
' MAD Cos(SRKSs TILL TiiK TKum OF THKiH KLKCTioNS kxpiked! We have seen a King ot' 
' England in an absolute fit of lunacy, which produced an interregnum in the Government. 
' The same may happen here with respect to our President ; and, although it is improbable that 
' the majority of both Houses ol Congress may be in that situation, yet it is by no means im- 
' possible ! [Docs not the present locofoco majority of the {)resent Congress verify this?] But 

• gentlemen have brought forv^'ard another argument with respect to the judges. It is said ihey 
' are to hold their offices during good behaviour, I agree that ought to be the case. But is not 
'a judge liable to the act of God as well as any other officer of the Government 1 However 
' great his legal knowledge, his judgement, and integrity, it may be taken from him at a stroke, 

• and he rendered the n)ost unfit of all men to fill such an important office. But can you re- 
' move him ? Nwt for this cause ; it is impossible, because madness is no treason, crime, or 
' misdemeanor. »•******** 

" But let me ask gentlemen if it is impossible to place their officers in such a situation as to 

• deprive them of their indepe)i<lency and firmness ; for, I apprehend if is not intended to stop 
'with the Secretary of Foreign Affairs. Let it be remembered that the congtilution gives the 
' President the command of the iiilitauy. If (in addition to this) you give him complete jmwer. 
' over THE MAN with thk STRONG BOX, lie will have the liberty of America under his 
'thumb. It ir- easy to see liie evil which may result. If he wants to establish an arbitrary au- 
'thority, and finds'the SECRETARY OF FINANCE not inclined to second his endeavors, 
« (j^ he has nothing more to do than to remove him, and okt oxe api'ointkd of PKiNciPLErt 
•moke congenial with his om X. Then, says he, I have got the army ; let me but have the 

• money, and I will establish my throne upon the ruins of your visionary republic .' Let no 
♦gentleman say I am contemplating imaginary dangers — the mere chimeras of a heated brain. 
'Behold the baleful influence of the iiotal pretiocatite ! All officers, till lately, held their 

• commissions during the pleasure of the Crown." 

* * * "I agree that this is the hour [the Ist session of the 1st Congress] in which we 
' ought to establish our Government ; hut it is an hour in which we should be wary and cautious, 
'especially in what respects the executive magistrate. With him [Washington] every ])ower 
' may be safely lodged. Black, indeed, is the heart of that man who even suspects him to be 
'capable of abusing them. But, alas! he cannot be with us forever ; he is liable to the vicissi- 
' tudes of life; he is but mortal, and though I contemplate it with great regret, yet I know the pe- 
' riod must come which will separate him from his country ; and can we know the virtues or lu'ces 
' of his successor in a very few years 1 May not a man with a Fandora\^ box in his breast come 
' into power, and give us sensible cause to lament our present confidence and want of foresight 1" 

" Mr. PA(iE, of Virginia, said : I venture to assert that this clause contains in it the seeds 
'of royal prerogative. If gentlemen lay such stress on the energy of Government, 
' I beg them to consider how far this doctrine may go. Every thing that has been said in favor 
' of energy in the Executive may go to the destruction of freehom, and establish a DESPOT- 
' ISM. This very energy so much talkeil of has led many patriots to the bastilk, to the 
' BLOCK, and to the halter. If the Chief .Magistrate can take a man away from the head of a 
' department, witliout assigning any reason, he may as well be invested with power, on certain 
' occasions, to take awav his existence. But, will you contend that this idea is consonant 
' with the principles of a free Government, where no man ouRht to be condemned unheard, nor 
' till after a solemn conviction of guilt on a fair and impartial trial ? It would, in my opinion, 

' BK better to suffer FOB A TIME THE MISCHIEF ARISING FROM THE CONDUCT OF A BAD 
' officer, THAN ADMIT PRINCIPLKS WHICH WOULD LEAD TO THE ESTABLISHMENT OF DES- 

' POTIC PREROGATIVES," &c. 

The reader knows full well how truly have these royal, the.ec despotic prerogatives, been re- 
alized, and that to the fullest extent, by thc' encroachments and usurpations of the Executive, 
during the last ten or twelve years. Now although these usurpers have professed the doctrine of 
" strict construction of the constitution," that instrun)ent confers no express power o^ removal 
so much exercised' by them ; and although Mr. Madison contended that this j)ower "is incident 
to the executive office," and essential to the responsibility of the President in seeing that the laws 
be faithfully executed by inferior executive oflicers, as he expressed it in the House of Rejire- 
sentatives in 1789, and though General Washington, Mr. J. Adams, Mr. Jefierson, Mr. Mon- 
roe, and Mr. J. Q. Adams, must have concurred with Mr. Madison as to this " incidental pow- 
er" to enable the President to insure the efficacy of the public service, under his supervision, as 
each of them made a few removals on that principle, yet none of them abused the power by 
perverting it to the illegitimate purposes of proscription, favoritism, or any other uses than those 
purely emanating from the dictates of the public good — a consideration that seems to hax'e had 
no part in governing th^^ transfer of the spoils system to the General Government under the pre- 
sent dynasty, contrary to their professed principles of literal construction of powers. 



But it IS proper lo say, as a part of llie secret bistory of this Iraiislor of liie spoils of office to 
the General (lovernnicnl, Mr. Van Burrn and his coailjutors met with considerable difficulty in 
tlie coniineticciiieiit of his plans in 1829. on account of the tjrpatcr favor of 8outi>ern men and 
vsouthurn jiriiicipies at llu* time with (General Jiickson. JN'oiie of the other Secretaries had yet 
done much in tlie way of proscription excefit .Mr. V'an Buren and Mr. Barry ; .-mil, on account 
of those removals that were made, Mr. Ritchie, of the Richmond Hnquircr, a supporter of the 
ailministratiou, was continually beardinjj the J'resident. Among the repealed instances of his 
setting his countenance against all reiuovals, exce[)t for good cau^e, and ivilli expJutmtorij rtu- 
sons, it will l>c sufficient lo iinle, from the columns of the Enquirer, the following : 

May 5, lS'.i9. — " VVe arc no advocates for the removal of good, failhiid, and meritorious 
' officer;", who have not been warm political partisans, hut we are o])posed to all corruption. It 
' is peculiarly iucambent upon the present administration to su|)ersede all faithle.'^.s olficcrs, to 
' look keenly into the dcprirtmeuts, remove every com[ilaint, anil cleanse the Augean stables ot 

Mav 12. — " Mr. Niles objects to members of Congress being appointed to executive offices, 

* cs.cc.i)t o{ ih? fiigkf fit <j;ra(h', i\i which wo have uniformly ai^reed with him. * * We 
' see no occasion lo change this opinion. * * The moment he [the President] apjiointd 
' ineiul)erai to niinisterial offices, as posttnastcrs, collectors, auditors, -Sic, it will be lii/ie for the 
'people to .speak nut.^' 

Ju.VK 5, '29. — "There have been some more recent removals at Washington. Justice re- 

' quires tlial tlie reaMfii.'i of ihem should be inrtlcrstood before we pass sentence upon them," &c. 

Ji/XE 5. — " We have understood all the cinunistances un<ler which Mr. Cniupliell received 

* the appointment, (of Treasurer,) and it is doi.ig him even less than justice lo say, that there 
' is nothing in tlie maimer in which he obtained it, at which the .-^lightest exception could be 
'taken by the m.tr^t fastidious opponent." 

Ju.VK 19. — " .Mr. Uan)pbell did not seek to turn Mr. Clarlte out He did n()t know that 

* Mr. (.'larke was to be removed — he had not any idea of becoming treasurer. When he was 
' told .Mr. Clarke is certainly to go out — will you accept the appointment 1 The most fastidious 

* delicacy could not take exception at the proposition. We /nww tin's to be the fart," &c. 

On another occasion, about this time, Mr. Ritchie went so far as lo twit the administra- 
tion over the sliouJders of .Mr. Berrien aiil Mr. A''.ui Buren, (fortifying himself at the same 
ti(ne with the assertion of jiopular discontent in Virginia,) saying, that "Mr. Berrien and 
Mr. Van Buren coul 1 tell the .National Journal why Virginians do not wish to turn one 
another out of oUice." From this side-blow by Mr. Ritchie, taken in connexion with his other 
oblique censures of removals and appoint mints, it is obvious there must have been some ])rivate 
iuter-commuuications between him and .Mr. Van Buren, dc|)recatory of the spoils system, which, 
however uncongenial with the spoiler's views, he had to endure in silence, under the terrors of 
popular wrath in Virginia, and betake himself again to hoj)c in the fiiliin — regarding, at the 
-N.taie time, with aggravated chagrin, the paramourit interest that (.Joiieral Jackson then felt for 
Mr. Caliiouu's pretensions lo the successi<m ; for, .Mr. Calhoun had withdrawn from the Presi- 
"lential contest, in 1824, had thrown his interest into tlu^ scales of Cleneral Jackson, and had 
••ontinued lo advocate his cause till it was successful in 1S28: yet hoping to attain the high 
objects of his own ambition, a.s the successor of General Jackson, after his enjoyment of one 
lerju. " But against thi.s consununiition of his wishes {iuys tlic Political Mirror, pat^e 124) 
all the powers of the i/«cA" fl.7 had combined. The potent magician had woven his etVective 
.••pelJ." .Vccordingly, after hesitating and pondering upon the policy of withdrawing from the 
Depattinen; of State, he archly concluded that, "opposed by the deep-rooted poj)ularity of Gen- 
eral Jackson, all hopes of success were vain ;" he, therefore, resolved to keep his |)osition, as 
iht^ most |iropitious; thence to avail himself both of General Jackson'.s affections and his resent- 
ments. He immediately set about to court \\\p former, by utiremitting attentions and assiduities 
towards the lady of General Jackson's mo.'=t favored Seceriary, the Secretary of War: and to 
arouse ilie la'ter passion, "Mr. Van Buren sprung a mine upon Mr. (^alhoun, which had been 
long dug beneatij the t\-ei of Uim wlto was th? oidy riral in llic Jackson party who could give 
-Mr. Van Buren uneasiness." 

" It was already filt (says the Political Mirror, page 125) that the intluence of (humbug) re- 
' fur III ha 1 given to the i'resident a poreiitiil, li' iviiironrltsicc, voice in designating his succes- 
' sor. His favor was as much to be sou:^/;!, as his enmity wa-^ to he. deprecated. It was, therc- 
' fore, a desirable stroke of policy for a Presidential aspirant logaiii the one, and to turn the other 

* upon hi.') rind. Mr. A'an Buren succeeded in elVecting this by a couj> de niaiire which has 
' rarelv beca surjjassed. In it, he exhibitc<l the consummation of art which conceals art; for 
' whilst he accmiiplished an elFectivc work, scarce the maik of a t-'ol is visibly*. The w-ork as- 

* fiume.s, what it is ntlirmed to be, the happy ministration of Providence. We will endeavor to 

* narrate the particul.i'"s of tiiis event, (says the Mirr. i-, ) preserving chronological order. 

" \Tr. Jaa\es A. Hamilton [afterwards SectTtary of JState, ('«r7 iiiUrim,') and then United 
' iSiates atto.rney for the southern district of New York] was delegated in 1627 to represent 

* the l\ew York 'J'ammany Society, at New Orleans, in the celebration of the 8th of January, 



• 1828, at that place. General Jackson had been invited by the Legislature of Louisiana to at- 

• tend the celebration. Mr. Hamilton joined the General at Nashville, whence he proceeded 

• with him and his suite. During the voyage, there was much conversation among the Gen- 
' eral's friends, in relation to various charges against the General, which the Presidential can- 
« vass had originated or revived; and, particularly, as to the uni'riendly course Mr. Crawford 

• was supposed to have taken towards him in relation to the Seminole war. [The reader 

• will observe that Mr. Crawford's views of the General's conduct in that war were known, or 
' supposed to be known. The application to be inade to him, therefore, could not be for information 
' of his views and conduct, but of the views and conduct oi others. If of others, of whom, save 
« Mr. Calhoun, Mr. Adams, or Mr. Wirt ! Mr. Adams's were fully known — Mr. Wirt's were now 
' unimportant. But those of Mr. Calhoun were interesting to the General, and to Mr. Hamilton 

• as the adjective of Mr. Van Buren. These circumstances raised the violent presumption that 

• it was a knowledge of Mr. Calhoun's conduct that was to be sought. ] It being understood 

• that Mr. Hamilton, on his return, passing through Georgia, would avail himself of ihe oppor- 

• tunity to visit Mr. Crawford, Major Lewis desired him, or Mr. Hamilton oflered, to ascertain, 
' truly, what occurred in Mr. Monroe's cabinet deliberations, in relation to a proposition siippos- 

• ed to have been made to arrest General Jackson for his conduct in that war, and to inform liim 
« of the result, in order, as Mr. Hamilton understood, that Major Lewis might be prepared to 

• defend the General against attack upon this point. 

"On his arrival at Sparta, Georgia, Mr. Hamilton, as he declares, ascertaining that Mr. 

• Crawford dwelt sixty miles on the left of his route, and might probably be absent from home, 

• resolved to push on to Savannah ; thereby to take a detour of l.'iO miles to the right, avoiding 
' one of 60 to the left, by a road, at that season of the year, much worse than that which he de- 
•clincd. At Savannah, Mr. Hamilton, under date of 25th January, wrote to Mr. Forsyth, then 

• Governor of Georgia, whom he had seen at Milledgevillc, on histuay to Sparta, requesting him 

• to procure from Mr. Crawford the desired information. Mr. Forsyth replied, February 8th, 

• 1828, thus: 

" I had a long conversation witli ]\Ir. Crawford, and afterwards read him your letter. By his authority, I stale, in 
reply to your inquiry, that,atanieeliiigof Mr. Monroe's cabinet to discuss the course lobe pursued towards Spain, in 
consequence of General Jackson's proceedings in Florida, during the Seminole war. Mr. Calhoun, the Secretary of 
the War Department, submitted to, and urgpii upon, tlie President, the propriety and necessity of arresting and try- 
ing General Jackson. Mr. Monroe was very mucli annoyed by it; expressed a belief iliat such a step would not 
meet the public approbation ; that General Jackson had performed too much public service to be treated as a younger 
or subaltern otTicer miaht without shocking public opinion. Mr. Adams spoke with great violence against the pro- 
posed arrest, and justified the General throughout, vehemently urging tne President to make the cause of the Gen- 
eral that of the administration." 

» * * [The Mirror, after stating many other facts, part of them respecting a correspondence 
between Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Calhoun in coHnexion with this subject, goes on to say, p. 12S :] 
"Mr. Hamilton was, at this time, 1st March, 1828, in possession of the following facts, most 
' important in their nature to a skilful politician. [Mr. Hamilton was then, as now, the polit- 

• ical, personal, and interested friend of Mr. Van Buren, and Mr. Van Buren had every need 

• which a skilful politician could have for ^uch facts, to be used at an opportune occasion.] Mr. 

• Hamilton knew, and we cannot for a moment doubt that Mr. Van Buren also theti knew, that 
•Mr. Crawford avowed that Mr. Calhoun had suggested the arrest, a court of inquirfj, or pro- 

• ceeding of some sort, against General Jackson for his conduct in the Seminole war; and that 

• Mr. Calhoun had denied that any measures against the General had been proposed by any one 

• in the Cabinet." * * " We have one fact yet to mention, which we think may have much 
•bearing on the case. Messrs. Van Buren and Cambreleng, in their Southern progress in the 
•spring of 1827, had spent several days with Mr. Crawford, whose principal friend Mr. Van 

• Buren Itad been in the election of 1824 ; and, as Mr. Crawford was in the habit of speaking of 

• these cabinet affairs, and of Mr. Calhoun, whom he most cordially hated and vengefully pur- 

• sued, it becomes highly probable, almost certain, that he communicated to his dearest friends 
« [Van Buren and Cambreleng] the inconsistency, as he supposed, of his enemy, in supporting 
•for President the man whom he had proposed to arrest, and probably to degrade." * * * 
•'Supposing Mr. Van Buren to have been then possessed of the facts, coinciding so well with 

• his interests, we might, had he not denied it, presume him to have been the puompter of Mr. 
' Hamilton's otherwise very extraordinary course." 

" But, if these facts might prostrate Mr. Calhoun, why not use them at the lime 1 The re- 

• ply is obvious. They could not be used with eflect. General Jackson was not President — 

• he might not be ; and to make him so, Mr. Calhoun's interest might be indispensable. Neither 
•the chief nor Mr. Van Buren would have ventured to quarrel with the Vice President at this 
•time." * * » "Until the winter of 1829-';J0, [these important facts, known to the friends 
'of General Jackson, remained unnoticed,] when the same Mr. Hamilton who h*ad so success- 

• fully and accidentally put the Vice President at issue with Mr. Crawford, called on Mr. For- 

• syth, then a member of the Senate, and requested him to give to the President the information 
♦he had given to him, (Mr. Hamilton.) • * * "Mr. Forsyth [from certain considerations 
•was induced] not to give the information, without Mr. Crawford's assent. Mr. Crawford was, 
•therefore, applied to in form, and his answer, dated 30th April, 1830, was obtained, confirm- 



41 

• ing and enlarging the details given by Mr. Forsyth in hia letter to Mr. Hamilton of the 8th of 
' February, 1828. Tiik copr of Mr. CuAwroiin's luttkb, di'LT certifikd, wad fuhnisued 
•to Gexf-hal Jackson oy thk 12th Mat, 1830." 

The siigaciou.s author of ihe Political Mirror says: "Supposing Mr. Van liuren to have lieen 
in possessinn of these facts, we might presume him to have been ihe proinpfer of Mr. Hamilloii's 
otherwise extraordinary course." " but," says the Mirror, p. 132, " It is the priviiego of the 
accused, in all cases, nay, ciisloii) makes it almost a duty, to plead ' not guilty' before a popu- 
lar or judicial trihunal ; but the question still remains, whether the evidence is suj/icienl 1u con- 
vict ?" The pul'lic have «ome recollection of the success, in regard to the views of Mr. Van 
Buren, with which this quarrel was waged between General Jackson and Mr. Calhoun. All 
the details of this political manoeuvre constitute one of the most singuLir passages in the history 
of court intrigue. A perusal of the whole statement, from which the above extracts are made, is 
richly worth the purchase of this precious volume. Shortly after that dexterous? achievement, 
Mr. V^an Uuien withdrew from the 8tati! Department, further to strem^then trie advantages he 
had gained in his triumph over Mr. Calhoun, in regard to his future prospects for the succession 
to the i'residency. On this subject the Mirror, page 137, says: 

" General Jackson's Cabinet was composed of one Van Buren man, [the little magician him- 
'self,] four Jackson men, and one Calhoun man. Now, had all these men been earnestly dis- 

• posed to promote the public service, instead of their jirivate ends, there was nothing in their 
•predilections which would have interfered with their public duty ; and all who were competent 

• might have continued in oll'ice. But their official stations gave patronage and injluence, w hich 
' might be serviceable to the LKADKiis to whom they were respectively devoted ; and Mr. Van 

• Buren, wiio, from long experience, well knew the v.:lue of these, retmhud fo wrest litem from 
'hands which would cmplnij them adz'encli/ to himself ; and to such a purpose [advertcly to 
' himself] it was supposed Messrs. Ingham, Branch, and Berrien were devoted. lie had just 
•succeeded in overthrowing a i)owerlu! rival, and the dispersion of these enemies seemed, as it 
•truly was, a trivial matter. On the 11th April, 1831, Mr. Van Buren took the new and suc- 

• cessful course of sacrificing his enemies, by an apparent offering up of himself; addressing a 

• letter to the President, he declared ' he felt it his duty to retire from the office to which the 

• President's confidence and partiality had called him.' " [Mr. Eaton had tendered his resigna- 
tion on the 7th April.] 

It appears that these gentlemen, in their letters of resignation, assigned such reasons for so 
doing as were supposed would be satisfactory to the public, and cover hidden motives and precon- 
certed arrangements. Gen. Jackson, also, to ))Ut the final gloss over the whole affair, assigned 
his reasons for reorganizing his cabinet. The Mirror says "there is a total want of keeping be- 
tween the reasons as.si£rned [by Gen. Jackson] and those given by the Secretary of State and the 
Secretary of War." Tiie same author further adds, page HO: 

"That the true motive for breaking up the cabinet were not those assigned by the President; 

• that it was an act premeditated ; and that the resignations of Messis. Van Buren and Eaton 

• were the consequences and not the cause of the determination, we have further evidence in the 

• confessions of the President and the wily Secretary, [viz:] 

"The President having invited to a private audience otie of the secretaries, (.Mr. Branch, 

• whom he was about to dismiss,) for the purpose of making known to him the new arrangements 

• on which he had determinied, said, with an air of diplomatic caution and studied precision, 'Sir, 

• I submit to you two letters which I have received from the Secretary of State and the Secretary 

• of War, resigning their respective offices, and ask for them your serious consideration.' 'Sir ' 

• replied the astonished Sec^tary, ' I am a ])lain man, and your friend. Our intercourse has been 

• of long duration, and you know that diplomacy is no part of my character or of yours. Be so 

• good, therefore, as to tell me frankly what you intend, and what you desire of me.' 'Then, 
' sir, I will inform you thai I mean to reorganize my cabinet.' ' Very well, sir; I hope you will 

• profit by the change. I have not been your friend for the sake of office. I wish only to be in- 

• formed whether my conduct, while in your cabinet, was satisfactory to you.* 'Sir,' said the 

• President, ' I have no fault to find with you.' ' With this assurance,' said the Secretary, ' I 

• am contented ; but allow me to inquire who is to be your Secretary of State?' ♦ Mr. Living- 

• ston,' was the reply. 'Who is to take the Treasury Department]' 'Mr. McLane, now 

• minister in England.' 'Who will occupy the Navy Department?' 'Mr. Woodbury.' 'And 
' pray, sir, who is to replace .Mr. McLane in England V ' Mr. Vax Bfur.y.' " 

"Soon alter the dissolution of the cabinet, whilst Mr. Van Buren was waiting at New York 

• the arrival of Mr. McLane from England, he replied to the inquiry of a partisan friend — that 

• he had the offer of the mission to the Court of St. James, but had not yet decided as to the jiro- 

• priety of accepting it. His friends, he said, differed as to tlie policy of his leaving the country 

• at that time, there being some arrangements to make in the rejjublican party, for future opera- 

• tions — and observed that he was anxious to have an interview with Mr. McLane, before de- 

• parture, should he determine to go. Beins interrogated as to the real cause of the dissolution 

• of the cabinet, he answered that Mr. E**** had no agency in the matter; but that it was 

• caused more by the conduct of .Mr. Calhoun and Mr. Ingham, ivho desired the retirement of 



42 

' General Jachson from office at the expiration of the first four years of his term of service, and 

' who hud endeavored to consummate their designs by traducing ihe character of . To 

' thrt remark that he, Mr. Van Buren, had managed well to pass unscathed through the fiery or- 
' deal, he laughingly replied, 'Yes, I had seen for some two or three months tiie approach of 
' triiuhle, and that a dissolution of the cabinet must ensue — the materials being too discord int to 
' continue together in harmony — and, to save myself, I thought it belter to retire in time, kxow- 

' INU Til.Vr IF I l.KO TUK WAY THE IlIiST MUST FOLLOW.' " 

Accordingly Mr. Vau Buren, in pursuance of the preconcerted arrangement, by which he re- 
duced the whole cabinet to a spoil, and appropriated a slice of §19,000 to himself, (having also 
artfully contrived to interweave into his letter of resignation a nomination of himself for the 
Presidency, as Gen. Jackson's successor, and to obtain the General's sanction of his course,) 
departed for Europe, in the summer of 1831, to represent the United States at the Court of St. 
.Fames, where he had but lately disgraced his country by his diplomatic instructions to Mr. 
McLanc. To convict Mr. Van Buren of this charge (which was tlie ))rincipal ground of the re- 
jection of his nomination by the Senate at the ensuing session, by the casting vote of Mr. Cal- 
houn, then A^ice President) it will he suflicient to contrast his own sentiments, expressed in a 
speech in the Senate in 1827, on the very same subject, with the corresponding past.'agc in his 
instructions to Mr. McLane in 1829. In his speech in the Senate, the '24th February, 1827, 
upon our negotiations to regain the British colonial trade, ho said : 

"In a Government like ours, founded on freedom of thought and action, imposing no neces- 

* sary restraints, and calling into exercise the highest energies of the mind, occasional ciilferences 
' of opinion are not only to be expected but to be desired." '•' But this conflict of opinion should 
' be conlined to subjects which concern our.* .Ives. In the collisions which may arise between the 
' United Stales and a foreign Power, it is our duty to present an unbroken front. Domestic dif- 
' ferences, if they tend to give encouragement to unjust pretensions, should be extinguished or 
' deferred; and ihe cause of our tiovernment must be considered as the cause of our country. 
' The humiliating spectacle of a foreign Government speculating for the advantage which it may 
' derive from our dissensions will, I trust, never again be the reproach of the x\merican people! !" 

Now mark what came directly afterwards from this political impersonation of the grossest con- 
tradictions and inconsistencies, as soon as the fates had put it in his power to act upon this very 
subject of regaining the colonial trade. In his instructions to our minister, dated July 20, 1829, 
he said : 

" If the omission of this Government to accept the terms proposed, when heretofore oflfered, be 

• urged as an objection to their adoption now, it will be your duty to make the British Govern- 
' nient sensible of the injustice and inexpediency of such a course. The opj^ortunities which you 
' have derived from a participation in our public councils, as well as other sources of information, 
' will enable you to spenk with confidence — of the respective parts taken by those to whom the 
' aihninistration of the Government is now committed, in relation to the course beretolbre pursued 
' upon the subject of the ' colonial trade.' Their views upon that point have been submitted to the 
' people of the United States ; and the counsels by which your conduct is now directed arc the re- 
' suits of the judgment expressed iiy the only earthly tribunal to which the late administration was 
' amenable for its acts !" " To set up the acts of the l.Tle administration as the cause of lorfeiture of 
' privileges which would otherwise be extended to the people of the United States, would, under 
' existing circumstances, be unjust in itself, and could not fail to excite their deepest sensibility." 
' " The tone of feeling which a course so unwise and untenable is calculated to produce, would 
' doubtless be greatly aggravated by the consciousness that Great Britain has, by orders in council, 
' opened her colonial ports to Russia and France, notwithstanding a sj^^ilar omission on their ])art 
' to accept the terms olVered by the act of July, 1825." 

In the name of all that is just and honorable ht me ask, was not the last recited fact suflicient. 
to satisfy Mr. \'an Duren's mind that the san)e privileges and participations in the colonial trade 
which were extended to Russia and I'rance under similar circumstances, would also, upon 
the customary honorable course of negotiation, be restored to the United Slates, without dis- 
gracing the preceding administration, and humiliating the country at the footstool of our ancient 
enemy 1 Not only, then, is Mr. Van Buren condemned, in advance, by his own judgment ex- 
pressed in 1827, for this anti-patriotic con iuct, but manifestly, it was a superfluous excess of 
party spirit, as wanton as it was uncalled for. But, nevertheless, it was in perfect good keeping 
with the whole tenor of Mr. Van Buren's 'political life, from which it would have been a singu- 
lar departure had he not done precisely ^vhat he did. 'J^he emphatic words of the author of the 
Political Mirror (p. IGfi) declare that "The nomination of Mr. Van Buren was rejected in 
Senate, upon the ground, didinctly put, that he, 'the Serretary of State for the United Slates 
of America, had shown a manifest disposition to establish a distinction between his country and 
his pa-lij ; to place that party above the country ; to make interest at a foreign court, for that 
])ai'ty, rather than for the country ; to persuade the English ministry, and the English monarch, 
that theyhd^A an interest in maintaining in the IJithed Slaies the ascejidency of the party to 
ivhicli he belonged..'' " "Other political sins of t.lie ex-Secretary (says the Mirror) were reviewed 
at this period, and none were more severely reproved than the quarrel he had caused between 



48 

the President and Vice Prcsulcrit, llic (lifipcrt,iiin of tlie lir.st liilmiet, and llio inlruduclioh of llic 
odious system oi proscriptinn (fur the exercise of the elective fraiicliise) into the (iovernnmnl of 
the United States — a sjsteiri drawn from the worst period of the Konian Kejiuhlic, making the 
oHices, lionors, and dignities of the [^leople, prizes la lie won, Imaty to bt i^uintd, at e\ery presi- 
dential election — producing contests that would be intoierahie, and which must result in inex- 
orable despolisni." 

This rejecfidii by the Senate, however imperiously called for to vindicate the honor of the na- 
tion against the stigma cast on it by the ollicial olleiiccs of the nominee, nevertheless furnished 
a new pi cot on which the wily politician and the abettors of liis purpose of xpoliuti/ms might 
turn their future electioneering operations. Very few persons either in Congress or aMiong the 
multitude of voters had any knowledgt^ of Mr. Van liuren's previous hyjiocritical and treacher- 
ous political course, by which he had successively wormed himself into high stations — but, re- 
garding him only as the adopted friend of (icneral Jack.^on, they generally considered the action 
of the Senate more in the light of an insult oll'ered to the venerated chief, than as a merited 
rebuke to a piiHticdl adventurer ; and therefore they' were in a state of mind fully predisposed to 
second and adopt any electioneering anangements to revenge the oll'ended I'rosident and lii.s 
discredited minister, by advancing him to the highest ollicial honors in the gill of his country, 
lirst by commissioning him to j)reside over the very body that had recalled him, ai;d, secondly, by 
commissioning him to [jroside over the whole I'nion, whose honor he had degraded us tiie foot- 
ball of his party, to which he has since given her treasury as a spoil. Jt is obviou^> then, that the 
whole popular enthusiasm that was immediately and industriously gotten up by the E.xecutive in- 
fluence, for the first time thrown into the political arena, was virtually and suiistanlially lo vindi- 
cate, through a generous, deceived, and abused people, at the ballot box, a guilty, condemned, and 
disgraced minister; and this, too, was to be efl'ccted by the artilices of Executive and other 
ollicial electioneering, through an organized party press, emanating from the suggestions of the 
otVender himself. 13ut he succeeded! and the public now know pretty nuH-h of the details by 
which 111' did succeed; and, inconsequence of the abuses he has practised since his election, 
and the jjcople's present better acquaintance with the dishonoroblu means by which iie has 
enabled himself tlius to abuse their confidence, they are now jueparcd to confirm the rejection of 
the Senate, by ejecting him from the Presidency. 

It being consonant with my plan, from the beginni >ig of tliis review, to lot Mr. Van Buren 
pronounce his own sentence of condemnation, as we have seen he has been compelled to <lo in 
the public prints in more cases than one of late, he shall have an O|)portunity to do so, once 
more, on the theme of the Third Period of his political career, which no doubt will be his last 
appearance in any political cijiaciiy. 



THIRD PERIOD. 



' 1 diiuu , ■.;, -xlh.il COLLISION, wliich seems inseparable, from the nature of man, behvrrii iho iik;iits of the 
fete aiul the iiuuii/, lo th-se iiovrr-cpasili? conflicts helweeuthe ailvoraies of l';(< e/tlunrimctit -.iUi] com etil ration 
'nf powEn '111 the one Iviiul, anil yrs tiiititaliou and distribution on ihe oiher: conflicts which in E.voland 
•:r«alcd titr. liinlinction bcluccn Whigs and ToKiES—llie latter striving tjy all means within iheir reach lo in- 
vreasc ihe imlclnc-e anil do:\^io.n- ot' ihe THRONE, at the expense of ifie common I'pujiIp ; anil ilie kou.mer lo 
ruunterart liie iweiilons of ihi Vailversarie?, l>y ubrideiiig thai dominion and infi.i-ence, for the advanccnif ni <if 
the rightK and coiiseciueei amelioration of the condition uf llie PiiOfLE/'—dV/jt fiu;c«"s si>eeclt nn l-^nolc's 
resolution, nesfion l&27-'~'>-) 

Mr. Van Buren, vhlk n Senntin- in 1828, reprohattd tJic Torjj prinripk of t/ic cn/nr^^enient 
and concentration of power, and itdvocntcd the Whiq principle of the limit tltion and disfriliu- 
ti m- of power : hix prwtices while President (f the United States cnnvic' hint, (ind r the criteria 
(f hin own Judgnitnl, iix an apostate \^hii^, a Tory, and n traitor to his country and her 
constilutiotx. 

Mr. Van Dnicn having exerted his great experience in political matters, while a Scnalor, a 
niomber of General Jackson's cabinet, and Vice President, in " uniting, harmonizing, and 
directing, those with whom he acted," to jiroinote executive encroachments on the oilier ile- 
partmenls of the Government, and to roncentrute all power in the President — ns I have demon- 
strated in tlie. foregoing sections — it remains now to say a few words on the uses and abuses he 
has made of those "concentrated powers" in the brief .space since, his election to the Presidency. 

I have already anticipated most of tliese details, by recitals and teferences incident to the First 
and Second Period.s of life just reviewed; and all the themes of this 'J'hird Period being made 
familiar to the public mind by executive messages, secretaries' reports, congressional procecdincrs, 
public discussions, and newspapaper notoriety, there is no occasion for me to dwell upon them 
here, though, in a practical sense, the most important period of the Magician's life. I have 



44 

taken a survey of the serpentine course by which Mr. Van Buren wormed himself successively, 
stealthily, and upon trust, almost without inquiry, into high stations, till he actually reached the 
topmost j)innacle of honor — showing how artfully he established redoubts and safe-guards about 
his imaginary throne, even before he had attained the platform on which he purposed to erect 
it. Preparatory to a summary recapitulation of those fortresses of concentrated and usurped 
powers, I shall cite one more remarkable instance of the wily man's fair professions, to show 
how Mr. Van Buren, while he was an humble suppliant before the People for small favors, 
condemned in advance his own subsequent acts, and, as a good Whig, in a speech, sneered with 
ineffable scorn upon the whole class of Tories who had ever practised the same acts be- 
fore him. 

In a speech in the Senate of the United States in the winter of 1827-'28, on Mr. Foote's 
motion to invest the Vice President with power to call to order lor words spoken in debate, Mr. 
Van Buren gave a good description of " Whigs" and " Toniics," showing the hostility of the 
former against that '■'enlargement and concentration of power," which he represents the latter 
as ever seeking to achieve and grasp in their own hands ; taking occasion, at the same time, to 
eulogize the whig principles of '' limitation and distribution of power." But how entirely he 
has reversed these professions by his practice, since he has officiated in the executive department, 
and particularly since he has been President of the United States, is at last in a fair way to be- 
come well known to every voter in the country. On the occasion above-mentioned, Mr. Van 
Buren said : 

" It is Ihe source from whence the power of calling to order liad been claimed for the Vice Presidpnt, which had 
excited his anxiety. In claiming that power by itnptication, he said, principles had been advanced and earnestly 
supported, against wliich /ic felt it lo be his du?i/, at least, to protest." "In every point of view, said Mr. Van 
Buren, in wliich this subject liad presented itself to )iis mind, it had produced but one sentiment, and that was un- 
auALiFiED OPPOSITION to lite PREUOGATiVE claimed for the chair. Althnugh this claim of power is now for the first 
lime made, ihe principle in which it originates is as old as tlie Government itself. I look upon it, sir, as ihe legiti- 
mate oft'siirino; of a school of politics which has, in limes past, agitated and greatly disturbed this country; of a 
school, the leading principle of which may be traced lo that great source of political contentions which have per- 
vaded every country where the rights rif man were in any degree respected. I allude, sir. lo that collision, which 
seems inseparable, from the nature of man, between the rights of the few and the many, to those never-ceasing 
conflicts between ihe advocates of the enlargement and concentration of power on the one hand, and its limitation 
and distribution on the other; conflicts which, in England, created the distinction between Whigs and Tories— 
Ihe latter striving by all means within their reach to increase tlie injluence and doviinion of the throne, at the 
expense of the common people ; and the former to counteract the exertions of their adversaries, by abridging that 
dominion and injluence, for the advancement of the rights and the consequent amelioration of the condition of the 
people." Again, " No candid and well-informed man will for a moment pretend, that if the powers now claimed 
for this Government had been avowed at the time, or even had not been expressly disclaimed, there would kave 
been ihe slightest chance for ihe adoption of the constitution by the requisite number of the old thirteen States. 
But it uas lalified, (said Mr. Van Buren.) and from the moment of its adoption lo the present day, the spirit 
he had described, had been at work to obtain by construction what jf as not inclxuled or intended to be included in 
the grant." " It was then that the monarchical and arislocratical character of the spirit he had described, was 
displayed in increasing eff iris to wrest from the Stales the powers that justly belonged to them, to exercise such as 
had never Ijeen conferred, and to concentrate, as far as practicable, all auihority in the hands of the 
President."— (<9££ Holland, pages 285, 291.) 

Thus did Mr. Van Buren once solemnly protest against the " iinplication of power," and de- 
clared his " unqualified opposition to the PUEnooATiVK. it claims;'' a prerogative which is in- 
comparably more dangerous in the President of the United States than in the Vice President, 
the mere presiding officer of the Senate. He also referred this " implication of power," and its 
consequent "prerogative," to a school of politicians who, he says, are ever seeking to enlarge 
and concentrate power in their own hands, whom he calls Tories, in contradietinction irom 
Whigs. And, in his zeal for whig principles, he even embraces the occasion to calumniate many 
of our revolutionary fathers who framed our system of Government and set it in motion, embra- 
cing General Washington, Mr. .Jefferson, and Mr. Madison, among tW^rest, of course, as a part 
of this school of politicians or Tories, who "advocate the enlargement and concentration of 
power in the hands of the few, in derogation of the rights of the many," for they advocated and 
practised, "implied" or "incident," executive powers that enure to the " responsibility" of the 
office, for the good of the service. Nay, he even extended this calumny by imputing, necessa- 
rily, to those and other eminent patriots, " efforts to wrest from the States the powers justly be- 
longing to them — to exercise powers by the General Government which had never been con- 
ferred upon it — and to concentrate all authority in the hands of the President." 

Now, after this seemingly ardent manifestation of Whig principles, even unto the extreme of 
perpetrating an outrageous calumny against many of our best patriots of the Revolution, this 
simple question arises — What has Mr. Van Buren donk, since he attained the Presidential chair, 
to repair, to curtail, and restore this enlargement and concentration of power in the General 
Government, and especially in the hands of the President ] Has he taken a single step towards 
it 1 No, not one ! 

1st. Has he repudiated ihe incidental or implied executive power of making removals from 
office ? Not he ; far from it. He has not even confined himself to that wholesome limit pre- 
scribed by Mr. Madison, of power "incident to the executive office," to remove Fon causb af- 
FECTixfi THE GOOD OF THE PUBLIC sKHvicE. On the Contrary, he exercises this "implied 
power" of removal lo the odious extent advocated by Tories, (not for cause, for such, generally, 
being of his own spoils party, he does not remove, but) for the indulgence of the most fiendish 



45 

of monarchical prerogatives, to pcmsh his political enemixs ; and ihnt, too, with less regard 
to the public good than if he were exercising the province of his personal rights or his private 
proper}]/. 

8d. iias he rpstrictc<l himself exclusively to the consideration of the good of the puMic service 
in making appointments ? He has not. Rather, he has made his apjiointnienls exclusively 
and avowed I ij xi^on the spoils principle, of conferring rewards on zealous partisans for their iiarfy 
services, otherwise called a " payment of political dcl'ts" — palpably substituting his partjj for his 
country — confirming, in a yet more aegravatrd form, this very charge of the Senate, on which 
they based his rejection as minister to England ; more aggravated, I say, because these very 
parly appointments, as part nf the system of rcilucing the conunonwealth to a !«poil, are sent to 
the Senate for their confirniation, and which, as his party vass.ils, they do conlirni. 

But this is not all, llcgarding the consequences of this latitudinous exercise of the correla- 
tive powers of removals and appointments, which are even preiended to be incidental or implied 
to the Executive ofl'ice, in the extent to which they are used, there has sprujig up, simultane- 
ously with this assumption of power, a system o{ peculations, fraudf, and dfalcations, that has 
jeoparded all the available resources of the 'J'nasury, as the rightlul spoils of the official patty, 
to the utmost bounds that they think proper to go ; for there appears to be no definite or recog- 
nised limit to tiiese depredations, except in the ditVerent degrees of hardihood of the individuals 
practising them. 

This system manifests itself, 1st. In the enormous charges made against the Government on 
account of all casual joiis, from the most trivial to the most important, in every department of the 
Government, when such opportunities are afTordcd to the favorites of the Executive. 2d. In 
extra alhwances, unknown to law, for services alleged to have been performed over and above 
the remuneiaiion of the regular balaries, or as being performed out of official hours — whereas, 
there are no such casualties to authorize an allowance of any sort in those cases, the fixed com[ien- 
sation of law entitling the Government to the entire service of its officers, without further charge, 
unless Congress chooses to make a donation upon any extraordinary emergency. 3d. This 
system of depredations manifests itself in \.\\e defalcations oi iiECKivEns and disdursehs of 
public money, to any amount that such otlicers may abstract, at intervals or by the lump, out of 
the moneys in their hands; which Mr. Van Buren consider.i to be "less objectionable in indi- 
viduals, than for corporations to use the public money" placed on deposiie with thrm by the 
authority of the Government! 

3d. Finally, has Mr. V'an Buren confined himself to the constitutional injunction that the 
President "chall from time to lime give to Congress information of the state of the Umon, 
and recommend to their consideration such me.vsuhes as ho shall judge necessary and kxpk- 
niEXT V He Ins not. In regard to the sub-Treasury measure, particularly, lie has also over- 
leaped the obvious limitation of this clause, and has taken the initiative, if not the entire, power 
of legislation into his own hands. In the first instance, he recommended th'j "consideration" 
of this measure, connected with a statement of ihe financial embarrassments of ihe whole coun- 
try, and of the banking institutions of the .States, in his message to the calleil Congress in 1837 ; 
but that body did not think proper to adopt the measure. Having thus pertormed his constitu- 
tional duty, here the matter would have ended, had he a sincere regard for the '• limitations of 
power." But, true to the Tory principles of "extending anti concentrating power," which he 
has substituted for the whig principles that he once eulogized of "limiting and distributing 
power," he has, at every subsequent Congress, insisted upon the adoption of the same measure, 
which he had, in fact, no right to advert to as such, unconnected with further information of 
the state of the Union in that regard, which alone could justify his bringing it forward as a new 
measure, based up(m the farther and severally communicated [new] information, from time to 
time, of the state of the Union. But more: without the new facts and information, the ab- 
sence of which stamps the several renewed presentations of the same measure as an Executive 
dictation to Congress, he has taken steps, through his party managers in the House of Repre- 
sentatives, to insure a majority subservient to his ambition, by disfranchising a sovereign State 
in depriving her of her full representation, by excluding five of her six members, legally return- 
ed, before the House was organized and in a condition to pass judgment upon the returns of itji 
members in any contested cases — thereby realizing a most daring encroachment upon the 
" rights of the States," which he once all'ecled to hold in such high veneration ! 

So far, then, from abandoning the specific enlargements of Executive power, or renouncing 
the encroachmenis on the legislative department, he has pressed them to the greatest extremity ; 
and even beyond these, he has on several occasions made vigorous eflbrts to raise the Executive 
authority above that of the Judiciary Department ; which, however, has been as yet successfully 
resisted, and that, too, the more to theircredit, by a bench constituted of his predecessor's appoint- 
ments in the proportion of seven in nine. 

All the rest of .Mr. Van Buren's Executive acts, which can in any degree bo made •ubservienl 
to party interest, which he holds above the interest of his country, are of a piece with this sum- 
mary, showing that he is, to all intents and puproses, an apost.ite Whig, a rank Tory, a traitor to 



46 

his country ami her constitution, for the sake of the hope to perpetuate his power, hy basely 
lioldiiig up the commonivealfh as a spoil to his deluded parfy ' 

Q^It mu.^t be obvious to the intelligent reader, that these few pages can only he offered, af 
a systematic outline, or frame-work, to be filled up by future details. 

But without these, the reader is now sufficiently initiated into the solecism, which equally sus- 
tains the truth that Mr. Van Buren did every thing, and advocated every opinion — and the con- 
trary of every thing and every opinion, that have been charged against him : Hence, his parti- 
sans dare deny the truth of those charges, when the fact is, that both allegations of his contra- 
dictory actions and opinions are true. He has been for and against every thing and every body, 
ktkhy opimox and eteut paiity, as it happened to suit the vakting phases of his ER- 
RATIC POLITICAli LIFE. But still it may be said, he has been constant in ihe.'se, becausf 
they have subserved his PRE-EMINENT coNSTAXCT IX THE PURSUIT OF THE SPOILS OF 
OFFICE AND THE COA'CENTRATION OF POWER. 

From the remotest ages, mankind have been admonished of the inevitable fate of the hapless 
wight who " blows hot and cold luith the same breath:" so the hypocritical example of tht 
POLITICAL adventuueh here unmasked, will be htdd in perpetual remembrance as a warning 
to all future aspirants at lawless power ; while the detection of his ambitious projects of self 
aggrandizement on the ruins of our admirable system of Government, is hapf)ily destined to in- 
sure it a duration with the imperishalile moral principle that will ever shudder at his history, 
and be taught thereby the lessons of ETERNAL VIGILANCE. 



CONTENTS. 



PRELIMINARY. 

" We contend for a well-rcgulaied Democracy." 

[Mm Mu7shall's s/)etc/i m the Virginia Convenlion on the adoption of the Constitution. 

riiPtrue Democracy — of Statesmen, Patriots, and lovers of the Constitution — contrasted with the 
false Democracy of restless, ymbitious innovators, and enemies of the Constitution. 



FIRST PERIOD. 

" Even Ml ihal early .igc, too, [fourteen, when he commenced the study of law,] Mr. Van Biiren is rep- 
■esenleii, by tliose who kiinw him, to have haii a s)>irit nf ol servalion, wiih recard io public events anii \he personal 
iisposito7is and characters of those around him, which gave an earnest of his (wurp p> oficie7iC)/ in the sciemj; 
3P POLITICS and of the human heart." 

[Holland's Life and Political Opinions of Martin Van Buren,page 10. 

[. Mr. Van Buren's bad fiiith, double dealing', and disingenuousness, exemplified in the case of 
his conduct to De Witt Clinton : — united with the Hudson and Hartford Convention Federal- 
ists in opposition to .Mr. Madison and the late war against England : — Kufus King, Jjincs A. 
Hamilton, &c , his political coadjutors. 

II. Mr. Van iJuien an abolitionist in heart — advocated the extension of the right of sufl'rage, and 
citizenship, to free negroes in Aew Vork, whereby they are also eligible to oHice ; — he also ap- 
proves the admission of slaves to testify, in court, against white citizens 

[II. Mr. Van Burcii opfiosed the adoption of a bill of rights with the New York constitution — lie 
opposed the e.Ntensiun of the electiva franchise — and he opposed the amenability of the higher 
officers of State to the ordeal ot popular elections: the inconsistency of his sentiments on 
the veto power — his advocacy of long terms and re-oleclion to the chief Executive — the incon- 
sistency of his doctrines and practice respecting the "spoils of ofl'icc ;" a system of which he 
was the uncnvicd author. 



SECOND PERIOD. 

" His long study of the human heart, [speaking of Mr. V. B. when he entered the Senate,] his cre.it experienco 
in political malteV-s, and his pro-eminent aood sense, liad given Iiim a power of interpreting tlie popular will,- and 
unilin'j, harmonizing, and directing the feelings of thsoe with whom he acted, which few men ever attain to." 

[Holland's Life, 4-c., page 208. 
. Mr. Van Burcn, uniformly, for a series of years, has been an advocate for a tariff or imposts 
for the protection of manufactures — His subseejuent repudiation of his first love, as an over- 
ture to the South — His support and denunciation of internal improvement, still more diversi- 
fied and inconsistcnt--Ilis claim of initiative legislation, alone, brings the money power very 
much within his grasp. 

II. Mr. Van Buren's inconsistency respecting the constitutionality of a Bank of the United States : 
His combined safety hank system in New Vork, for political purposes: Failure of his attempt 
to seduce or intimidate the United States Bank to the embraces of Executive dictation — as a 
substitute for which, he introduces his New York system, by combining State banks, as de- 
positories of the Treasury, onder Executive control : Explosion of the system occasions a re- 
sort tt) a sub-Treasury bank, in order to accomplish the original design of usurping, concen- 
trating, and mono[)oli7.ing the money ])owcr. 

III. Mr. Van Buren the author and perfccter of the great spoils system — The direct spoils of 
office only a branch of that sy.-lem — .\ key to the machinery used to bring this whole system 
to perfection, and concentrate it in the hands of the President, consisting of the Press, the 
Post (Jffice, the .\rmed Force, and the Appointing Power — Their several uses and abuses in 
the hands of a corrupt Executive, in monopolii#ig the whole money-power, and reducing 
"the Commonwealth to a spoil.' 



THIRD PERIOD. 

" I allude, sir, to the collision, which si-enis insppaialile,fn>m the nature of man, between the rights of the few and 
the many, lo those never ceasing conflicts between the arlvocates of the enlargement and concentration of fmwer on 
the one iiand,and its limitation and distribution on the other: conflicts \vhich~in England created the distinction be- 
tween WhiL'Sand Tories- the latter striving.by all means within tlieir reach lo increase the influence and dominion 
of the Throne, at the exiienseof the conniion peojile ; and the former to counteract the exertions of their adversaries 
by abridging that dominion and influence, for the advancement of the rights and consequent amelioration oi the con- 
dition of the people." — ( \'a7i Hnrcn's speech on Foole's resolution, session \>f2T-'28.') 

Mr. Van Buren, while a Senator in 1828, reprobated the Tory principle of the enlargement and 
concentration of power, and advocated the Whig [)rinciple of the limitation and distribution of 
power: his practices while President of the United States convict hinr, under the criteria of his 
own judgment, as an apostate Whig, a Tory, and a traitor to his country and her constitution. 



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